Let the 2nd New Continent Games begin!
by tessa0710
Summary: It has been one year since Europe organized its first, gruesome New Games featuring 160 tributes from all 35 Districts. Now the time has come to compete in the second annual New Games, where the arenas will be more merciless than ever. Who will be the next victor of Europe's Games? Rated T for violence and language.
1. Chapter 1

**Hey everyone! **

**I'm back with the second Games. I've written up to page 30 so I already have some material but hey, there are more things in the world besides fan fiction. It will take longer than usual before a new chapter is up, maybe up to a week without update, but the chapters will be longer.**

**For those who haven't read my first fan fiction ("Let the first New Continent Games begin") I recommend reading it, because it is a source of information for this story and you will enjoy this story more if you have read the first part. However, be friendly, because my English wasn't as good back than as it is now (it's still not perfect, but I'm working on it). So I regularly made grammar and spelling mistakes and they will also be in this story. I apologize in advance. **

**Furthermore, here is a short summary if you do not feel like reading the first part:**

**The Hunger Games haven't been as good as they used to be since the third Quarter Quell. After the worst Games ever, the 97****th**** edition, the Capitol announced that, in collaboration with the Head City, they would organize the New Games. The Head City is a city built by the Capitol on an island located above what used to be Great Britain. Panem conquered Europe many years ago and Europe, now called the New Continent, consists out of 35 Districts, whose borders are for a great deal the same as they were in the year 2000. The New Games featured a group of 5 friends per District, making a total of 160 tributes. Most of them die during the preliminaries, leaving a group of 40 to battle in the actual arenas. The first Games were a huge success. They were won by Indiana from District 4, former Netherlands, after she killed her best-friend-turned-bad-District-partner Poppy. **

**It is eleven months after Indiana came out as the first victor of the New Games. I will take you to the grey, rainy Main City of District 1, has been United Kingdom, where the future victor of the second Games is hiding in a dark corridor, trying to survive in the crowded, poor, filthy city where everyone has been anxious the past weeks. The second reaping could take any moment, the citizens and possible tributes (everyone aged 13-18) just don't know when…and where.**

* * *

Today used to be my mother's birthday. Today she would have turned thirty-five. However, she will never become thirty-five, because she died during the invasion.

'Hurray' I whispered and my hands embraced a cup of tea. I blew and took a sip which burnt my tongue. My bottom was frozen because I was sitting down in the muddy, melting snow and my clothes weren't that warm. Today had been the tenth time I ran away from the orphanage. Officially I was probably too old to still be living there. I was seventeen. But I had nowhere to go. District 1 in general wasn't very poor, but our biggest city was crowded, filthy and there were homeless everywhere. The grey, square buildings around me rose up in the air and stench from open gutters was constantly there. Skinny children were begging on the streets, sleeping in an orphanage or freezing to death during the winter that was coming soon. I had to consider myself lucky. I had the opportunity to go to school, even though I was sitting here in this mess.

By sitting here I wanted to escape my unruly life for just one moment. This corridor was dark and unsafe, but quiet. I took another sip of my tea and stared at the wall in front of me.

Both my parents died eight years ago. When they were still around, we were poor, but it was easy to survive. There was food on the table every evening, we had a roof over our heads. However, since they abandoned me, things went wrong, and I mean very wrong.

My mother was the only person that truly considered me a nice girl.

I had to go to school this morning. I had played truant a lot lately, but since the school administration had told the owner of the orphanage about me skipping classes, I was forced to finish my last year of high school. Everything was so much fun in District 1 of the New Continent.

I drank my remaining tea, burnt my whole mouth and raised. I got my bag, threw it over my shoulder and put a ponytail in my hair. It was time to go to the prison that was called school. I would meet Kara at our usual spot, where we always met when we both went to school. Kara was my best friend. She was just like me – a dayfly, with no chances in life. We looked like each other too, exept her hair was brown and mine was ash blonde. The city citizens were nervous and unruly today. I saw nervous people everywhere. This city was the biggest in the whole continent, apart from the Head City. Well, I assumed that, because we didn't get much information about the other Districts lifestyle until the first New Games last year. All the average District citizen knew about other Districts was their location and if the location was in West or East. West was mostly rich, with healthy citizens, and East was a living hell, although the Head City and the Capitol tried to deny that Oh, the New Games. That was the reason why everyone was so nervous. The suspected reaping could be anytime soon. It was November already. Last year, around this date, the New Games were announced, and when it was close to Christmas eve they had their first victor: Indiana, that girl from District 4. When they announced the Games I couldn't care less. The message about Panem being bored with the Hunger Games wasn't important to me. I knew that, even though our District had to participate in Games now, the chance of being reaped was maybe one in five million. District 1 had almost 80 million inhabitants, from which 20% were living in this main city. Anyway, I watched parts of the Games on the big screen they had placed on the Big Square and they were cruel and disgusting, but surprisingly exiting too.

Apparently everyone was anxious because of the approaching reaping. It was always done in top-secret – one school per district is selected to reap a group of friends which is forced to participate. No one knows which school it will be and no one will know until the tributes arrive at the Head City central train station, which, in case of District 1, wasn't a long journey: maybe less than 500 kilometers.

I crossed countless squares and roads with my hands in my pockets. It was raining, like it usually did here, making the roads slippery because of the dirty snow that was left of last week's storm. The climate here was abominable. We were one of the few Districts located on an island. We shared our island with District 33 and District 34 was also an island, but far from the Continent. Their tributes had to travel to the Head City by boat.

At last I arrived at the spot where I met Kara. She was waiting for me with a umberella in her hands. She was wearing a long, shabby raincoat and her long hair was a mess.

'Hi' I said. She greeted me and looked over her shoulder. 'Let's go' she said.

We walked to the bus station.

'I hate going to school' I complained 'why don't we skip another week or two?'

'Don't you want to escape this life?' Kara said 'by the way, I bought a dose of morphling yesterday but I lost it.'

'Shit'

We go into the bus, sat down and the bus drove us to school. The weather was still horrible and rain drops made soft sounds on the glass. We descended at the stop close to our school, Vanitas High. The first thing we saw while descending were two peacekeepers, chatting with each other. They barely noticed us.

'What are they doing here?' Kara asked.

'Dunno. They probably caught someone with illegal stuff or something' All I did was hope it wasn't for us, maybe they had opened my locker…and why peacekeepers? They barely showed up in Districts, we had crappy policemen to arrest teenage girls on drugs.

However, when we walked past them they didn't do anything. We entered the school, shook our clothes because they were wet. We were over twenty minutes late. Our class was on the first floor, so we wanted to walk to the stairs, but the porter yelled 'STOP!' while he was marching towards us. 'You are too late. Kingsleigh, Fisher, detention this afternoon. Fisher, go to class. Kingsleigh, Mrs. Johnson wants to see you.'

We complained, but it didn't seem to bother him. 'I'll see you in the break' murmured Kara.

Mrs. Johnson was the school psychologist. I had no idea why we had one in the first place, but she often wanted to talk to me about my life. She was extremely concerned and extremely rich. People say she and her husband owned a massive mansion in the countryside.

I knocked on her door and a soft voice told me I was allowed to come in.

'You wanted to see me?' I growled, while the lady behind the desk smiled.

'Yes indeed, Abbey. Please sit down.'

I sat down and waited. She made me so nervous with all her advice the last years. I looked up to her in a certain, strange way. She was a successful woman and she was something I would never become. I would probably die from an overdose at age thirty. However, if I was born in a wealthy family, I would have become just like her. I was sort of smart.

'So, how are you going lately? Tell me everything, I'm interested.' She leaned backwards and stared at me.

I pressed my lips together. 'It's getting colder' I said after a while.

'Yes' she said 'so, are you feeling different now that you know the second Games will be organized this month? Are you afraid?'

'Hell no' I said 'Eighty million people are living in District 1. The odds of being reaped are one to a million.'

She nodded. 'Well, I want to get to business. This period is almost finished, the break will start soon. Unfortunately there's a meeting in the auditorium which everyone must attend, so-'

'Our school has been selected to reap District 1's tributes, isn't it?' I remarked dryly. Everything fell in its place; the peacekeepers, the nervous behaviour of our teachers. A meeting. Yeah, right. I was surprised how cool I remained on the outside. Actually my heart started beating.

Mrs. Johnson was trembling. 'I don't know' she said.

I knew she was an excellent liar, so I couldn't decide whether she was telling the truth or not. I sighed and stared at the ceiling.

'However, before the bell rings, I want to announce that I heard from a reliable source that you are using morphling from time to time. Is that true?'

I was more afraid now than I was when I found out our school was probably chosen to reap tributes. My regular use of morphling was one of the few things I'd been able to hide for mrs. Johnson. How did she found out? Was she going to tell the principal and the police? The use of morphling wasn't legal here like it was in Panem. It was a prohibited substance on the New Continent, although many people used it in District 1 and our sloppy police never caught someone.

Her eyes were piercing in mine and I knew lying wasn't an option. She was able to detect lies even better than bringing them up.

'Is there another way to stay sane on the streets of the Main City?' I said emotionally 'I've got a heart and a brain, you know!'

'I understand' she said 'but I'll have to take the accusation seriously.'

'Who told you?' I asked.

'Jess Woods, but that's not the point-'

Before she was able to finish her sentence the bell rang and I stood up quickly.

'Excuse me. I am going to have a little talk with Jess.' I said politely, and I ran out of her office. Mrs. Johnson yelled my name and I knew she would come for me, but I didn't care.

I knew where Jess was right now, because she was always alone during the breaks – studying in the hall.

Jess Woods was the most annoying girl in my eyes. She was my ultimate opposite. Rich, timid and snobby. She irritated me with everything she did and I didn't care I was the one who made her High School Life a total hell.

I marched to the hall, saw Jess doing her homework and pulled her hair from behind.

'Hi, Jess' I said, and I threw her on the ground. I jumped on top of her and started to hit her with my fists. She started crying and tried to scratch me.

Several students seemed interested and started cheering. I threw Jess' head against the floor and punched her in her stomach.

After a few moments some teachers pushed the students out of their way and pulled me off the girl. Her nose was bleeding, her eye was black.

'That's what you get, bitch, when you mess with me!' I shouted at her, and she started to cry even more. A couple of teachers grabbed my arms and while I was kicking and protesting they held me in a firm grip. They brought me to a small, dark space with a chair and a table in it.

'Someone will be with you in a minute, miss Kingsleigh, to have a good conversation with you about your misbehaviour. A peacekeeper, maybe?'

**Next update in the new year and merry christmas!**


	2. Chapter 2

While I was waiting in the small, dark room, I smiled. This had been the tenth useless threat. Nothing ever happened. I regularly fought on the streets, and I was pretty good. Sometimes my opponents had to go to the hospital. One girl almost passed away. Kara also liked a good fight. I wondered why we were not yet expelled.

I waited and waited, but no one came. I heard everyone gathering at the auditorium and I was getting nervous. We were probably selected to reap District 1s tributes. I was supposed to be there, in the auditorium. I was a possible tribute, aged seventeen. I would become eighteen in a couple of months. I scratched my head and wondered if I had to sneak out to be present at the reaping. However, when the auditorium was apparently filled with people the principal started speaking, and I was able to hear it well.

'Good morning, Vanitas High' she said happily. Because I was locked up in a room I wasn't able to see anything, but I could just imagine her standing in the stage.

'I hope you are all enjoying this school year, and of course the staff will be pleased to help you with any questions. Now, we are gathered here today because of a message we received a couple of months ago. I demand your attention, because-'

And then she said something, but I couldn't understand it. I pressed my ear against the door.

What if they reaped me? The odds had increased by a hundred thousand times! Who would come with me if they reaped me, which 'group' did I belong to? Kara, probably. And Rose and Flora.

Rose and Flora were identical twins. We've been friends since half a year, since they transferred to our class. They were a little more 'good girl' than Kara and I, but we still got along very well.

During that short time I was lost in thoughts a lot of screaming reached my ear. Apparently they revealed the ugly truth. Had they completely forgotten I was still here?

'And now I will pull a paper out of the bowl' shouted the principal while everyone was still panicking. I imagined an invisible hand going into the bowl with paper and pulling one out. One tiny paper. The previous year, six boys names were written on it.

How big were my chances? Small, right? I leaned dangerously far forward on my chair so I could press my ear against the door. She could say the names any moment.

'Aa! Shit!' I screamed, and the chair made some noise while it fell against the door. A scratch appeared on my cheek and I fell on the ground. I leaned to far. It fucking hurt, and I probably missed the names because of my scream. Damn. I kicked the door as hard as I could. Why didn't they set me free?

OK, they would probably take the reaped kids to this room; they had to be isolated immediately. Students and staff from the selected school had to keep their lips sealed about the tributes until the group arrived at the Head City. If they didn't, death penalty was waiting. Well, they would release me if they had to bring the tributes to this place.

I put the chair on its feet again and sat down, waiting for someone to come in.

After a minute or so I heard footsteps. I stood up again. The door opened and a peacekeeper entered, accompanied by four girls.

'Oh Jesus' I said.

The first face I recognized was Kara's. It looked more insecure than ever and her eyes were at the ground. Next to her were Rose and Flora, arm in arm and identical. The peacekeeper moved to the side so they could pass. As soon as Kara saw me, her mouth started trembling and she ran to me. She embraced me.

'You too' she whispered, while some warm tears dropped on my shoulders.

I was silent. I felt remarkably calm and in control. My name was on the reaped paper. Properly written, Abbey Kingsleigh, Kara Fisher and Flora and Rose Jameson. Tributes from District 1 for the second annual New Games of the New Continent. Participants in a pageant of eternal fame and glory.

I stroked Kara's back. I'd seen her cry before, for example when we had to deal with scary side effects of morphling, but somehow this was more intense than ever.

I looked over her shoulder, at Rose and Flora, who stood silently together and watched us. I stretched my hand to them, and they took it. They embraced us too.

Friendship was the only thing I had besides all poverty I had to deal with. And I might seem like a slutty, unfriendly junk to everybody, but I had feelings too. I was a tribute in the Games. I was going to die, together with Kara and Flora and Rose.

'We'll give you a minute' said one of the peacekeepers and he closed the door. As soon as they left, we were able to talk some more.

'It was so scary' Kara cried 'she pulled that paper, and it went so quick, we were still in shock- and then our names were on it and you weren't there and we didn't know what do do…' she was crying hysterically. I was listening with only one ear, because I discovered a fifth person in the small room.

Jess.

She saw me staring and she stared back as if she wanted to challenge me. I became furious, but kept myself together.

'What are you doing here?' I asked rudely.

'I'm a tribute too. apparently I belong here.' She answered.

'They must have made a mistake' Flora said softly 'We are not your friends.'

'No one's your friend.' Rose said coldly.

'I think they put me in a random group.' She murmured 'Do you think I want to be here? I know I don't belong here!' It seemed like she was overwhelmed by her own courage. 'I don't want to spend my last days with you!'

I showed her my teeth, but before I could attack her Rose and Kara grabbed my arms. Jess slowly walked backwards, while her eyes were teary. She had several small injuries from our little incident earlier today. I took a breath, grabbed a chair and put my elbows on the table while putting my fingers in my hair.

It finally caught me. We would be in the Head City tonight. It was not that far away. Travelling by train it wouldn't even take half a day.

Kara got another chair and sat down too. 'It will be allright' we said to each other at exactly the same time. I smiled and watched Rose and Flora sit down too.

'What about me?' said Jess, when she saw there were no chairs left

'You do not matter' Kara answered.

My hands were trembling and it was cold – we were going to be in the Games. It was us, we were tributes, out of five hundred thousand possible kids. I was going to die, my friends were going to die, and even if one of us wan still four would be dead.

I had watched the Hunger Games in Panem several times. This year they held the 98th edition, but it was so unsuccessful there were rumors they wanted to cancel the Games. Forever. Their Districts were probably happy. Now it was our job to provide entertainment for the world. The 98th Games had lasted for two days, because the Gamemakers wanted to end it as soon as possible. Like that, two suddenly fell into a volcano or something. Sometimes the ground literally split underneath the tributes' feet. But all that wasn't enough to make people as enthusiastic as they were for the New Games. One edition was enough to show the Head City and the Capitol how 'exciting' they could be. Even the people in the Districts were gripped by tension. Moments like the wolf-attack in the mountains or the face-to-face fights were nerve wrecking. And now I was going to be there myself, in case I survived the preliminaries. Probably not.

Well, I was pretty smart. And my street life had hardened me. I regularly fought, like I said, and I regularly won, so that would an advantage. Kara and I would have a good shot at coming far. It couldn't be that hard to kill a person. I wasn't that sensitive.

'We'll be in the Head City tonight' Flora said shrill. Jess stood angrily in the corner. She was afraid, frustrated and blown away by the fact that she was reaped.

'I can't believe it' Rose said. She looked at her twin, who stared back like a mirror.

'You'll have to' Jess said, but when she saw our looks she said nothing anymore.

After some time the door opened again and a peacekeeper entered. He announced there were some people to say goodbye. At least that was one positive thing: I didn't have any family so I didn't have to miss anyone.

Rose and Flora were raised by their single mom, who worked as a secretary at another school. They lived in a grey, filthy flat in the suburbs. The twins ran to their mother and started whispering.

Jess' family was completely different. A man in a suit and a woman with a pearl necklace were waiting for her. A little girl with two braids held the woman's hand. They were a family who loved each other, where food was on the table every evening. Jess never suffered. I felt some jealousy and looked down.

I noticed there was, like I predicted, no one for me. However, there was someone for Kara; and elderly man, her 'sugar uncle'. He usually provided her with morphling. I didn't know how she usually paid him, but I had a slight feeling on what it could be. It was nice he had come to say goodbye to her, although it sounded scary.

And all I did was watch the goodbyes.

'Abbey' someone said behind me. I turned around and saw Mrs. Johnson leaning against the corridor's wall. She pointed to the small room.

'Do you have a minute?'

'I've been in there all morning' I shouted, but I knew I had to obey. I followed her back inside. She closed the door. Then she turned around.

'I've been thinking' she said quickly.

'What?' I said.

'This is your ultimate chance.'

I grimaced. 'Going to the Head City to slaughter or be slaughtered? What kind of sick person are you? What do you mean? Am I worthless or something?'

'No' she said 'this will be your chance to improve your behaviour. I don't have much time, so let me explain it in the shortest way possible. You have a good shot at winning, you know, but you have a natural instinct for survival. And I'm going to help you to become a better person during the Games.' She remained calm while I stared at her with a frown.

'Let's make a deal. If you improve your behaviour, I will sponsor you. It could save your damn life, you know. I have a whole basement stuffed with money. And I'm willing to invest it in your life.'

I didn't know what to say. For the first time I had absolutely no response to something. My heart screamed it was a ridiculous offer. I couldn't stand authority. But my sense had to admit Mrs. Johnson was right. These Games could change my life, but only if I won. And sponsors could give you the win. I just had to show people I wasn't the asocial slut I seemed.

I looked her in the eyes. 'I'll try' I said. I didn't even believe myself.

A peacekeeper opened the door. 'Time to go' he said.

'Think about it!' mrs. Johnson said, while the man pulled my shoulder.

'I know how to walk!' I said and the peacekeeper released me.

**Sorry if I made grammar/spelling mistakes or typo's :(**


	3. Chapter 3

I walked outside. It was a grey, windy afternoon and it was raining. My head had slipped in some sort of depressing trance and my mind begged me for some morphling. Kara walked next to me. She wasn't crying, but her eyes were red.

Two cars were waiting for us. There was room for three in each car. We looked at each other for a short time.

'Well, how are we going to split up?' Kara asked eventually.

'I'm not going in a car with her' I said, pointing at Jess, who was crying again.

'Me neither' Flora and Rose said at the same time.

'Well, the four of us will go in one car hen. She takes the other one' Kara said. The drivers didn't object while we installed ourselves on the back seats without putting belts on. While looking trough the wet window, I saw Jess going to the other car. I tried to think about how she would be feeling, but all I could think of was black.

The car's motor started and while we started driving, I took a last look at the school, which seemed a scary ghost house in this depressing rain. I would never have to go to school again. Never take classes I hated, never again conversations with Mrs. Johnson, never go back to the orphanage with all those screaming kids. We were leaving District 1 and we would never come back, only if there was an arena here. The first thing was surviving the preliminaries.

'Where are we going?' asked Rose.

'The train. It's not an Intermanche, you know, the one they use for long distances. It's a Civilvehicle because the journey won't be that long.' the driver answered.

I didn't feel like fighting with anyone, so while scratching my hair I just looked outside. Maybe I had to be happy for going into the Games. This would be the end of my useless, crappy life. Maybe I had to take a giant dose of morphling before going into the preliminaries, so that I wouldn't have to experience it all with full sense.

Everyone remained awfully quiet in the car. Usually Kara and I were always the one speaking, but now she was scratching off her nail polish and I was trying to look at something, it didn't matter what. Tonight we would be in the Head City and it would take days before all the other Districts had arrived. We were going to spend a week in all luxury we could imagine. At least that was a happy thought.

'Why did Jess have to come with us?' Kara asked, clearly annoyed.

'It's too bad for her they made a stupid mistake. She really doesn't belong here.' Rose said softly. We all shook our heads.

'You know what? I've got an idea. What if we all shut the hell up and soak our brains with our own, depressing thoughts' Kara suggested.

Eight years ago the war between District 1 and District 33 ended. District 33 was located on the island next to hours and one day they attacked us for no clear reason and without any negotiation with the Head City. Later it turned out they wanted more ground. Our District used to be very rich, maybe one of the richest of the whole Continent. But this war had ruined it all. The Head City never stopped the violence for unknown reasons and they let it all happen. They almost seemed amused with the bloodbaths. That was the year the Hunger Games in Panem started to become weak. And after twenty years of war it seemed that the Head City and the Capitol felt it was enough and suddenly our District was supplied with tons of heavy weaponry. One last, epic battle was fought at Llelywynn, District 33, and we crushed them. Almost the entire male population of 33 had died when they surrendered, while only several hundred thousand people from District 1 were killed.

That included my mother and father. My father fought in the battle of Llelywynn but was one of the scarce victims, and mom was killed during an air attack on the Main City. Around that time I was at school and I remembered I wasn't allowed to leave until the alarm stopped. I sat in front of the window with Kara, staring at all the danger outside. Her father was killed that day as well. Her mother had died during a plague epidemic twelve years ago.

And when the war was over I had to take care of myself. I was nine. Emergency camps were raised out of nowhere. The inhabitants of District 1 didn't know what to do. The riches they were used to being a part of West had all vanished. The Main City symbolized anything that you'd find in East. District 1 became terribly poor and had to rebuild everything. Nowadays they had progressed a lot. Living in the countryside was quite agreeable, but the cities were still horrible, dirty places. And I had experienced all sides of the crowded towns.

It was going to be weird, being in the Head City. Seeing all the glamour with my own eyes. Would it rain a lot, like it did here?

I thought of Jess, whose parents both survived the war and who didn't seem affected at all by all poverty our District had to face the past decade. That was one of the reasons I couldn't stand her: some people had everything, some people had nothing.

'We're there' the driver said. We pushed each other out of the car, silent and annoyed. I looked up and saw a small train station. It had to be around 3 PM, but because of the heavy rain it looked like it was already evening. How long would the journey to the Head City be?

A train was waiting for us. It was a shiny thing from the Head City, the Civilvehicle, produced in District 11, which was responsible for travel over land.

I zipped my jacket, because it was cold.

'Come quickly!' shouted a figure who had appeared at the vehicle's doors. The shadow bid us to come in. We ran across the platform and without paying attention to anything or anyone, I jumped into the train. I was standing in a small hall. I shook the water off my clothes.

'Hey, you make things filthy' said the person who let us in. I looked up. It was a man with light brown hair, around 30 years old.

'Probably' I said. He raised his eyebrows and I shook another time. Rose and Flora giggled.

The door automatically closed and we were officially out of the rain. We were in a very small room with six people.

'Well, let's go to the living coupé.' Purposed the unknown man, while he was trying to avoid the puddles we created. He showed us the way and opened a door. 'After you'

Kara was the first one to enter and I pushed Jess away to follow her. I had never seen something like it. Golden doorknobs, leather couches. This was a train, damnit! The rain blew against the windows.

While we were all walking around and admiring everything, the man said: 'Er…welcome'

We murmured something.

'I am Laika, District 1s escort. Maybe you recognize me from last year.'

'You were on Head City TV after the preliminaries' Jess said.

'That's right. Well, lovely to meet you. The weather is horrible.' He noticed.

'It's november' Kara said.

'Luckily the Head City doesn't like seasons. Always summer, it's absolutely fabulous. Please, have a seat. I'm going to find Charlotte.' Laika announced.

'Who's that?' I asked.

'Your mentor. A very important person.' He answered. And as fast as he had come into our lives, he disappeared. I chose a big, brown sofa to sit in and leaned backwards.

'It sucks we are here to fight to the death, but I can get used to this.' Kara said.

'Hm-hm' I said and I took a quick look at the bottles on a table in front of us. 'Fancy' I said. I opened one, took a few sips. 'It's delicious'. Alcohol was just what I needed.

'Give me some' Rose said. I gave her my bottle and I took another.

Jess pulled her nose up and stared out of the window.

Suddenly some disturbing sounds could be heard. A high-pitched scream in another coupé, struggling sounds and running footsteps. We stood up and tried to see something through the door from the coupé we were in, but there was nothing to see.

I kicked against one of the table's legs, which made the delicate furniture tremble. Why wasn't I trying to jump off this train? Back to my boring, poor life on the streets, some morphling when I needed it…

Rose and Flora sat next to each other on a couch and held each other's hand. If you did not know them well, you wouldn't see a difference between them. The Head City probably liked that, siblings in the Games. Three times hurray for them.

Our escort, Laika, entered the coupé. He looked stressed and had a big, wet spot on his shirt.

'I'm so sorry' he said 'It got out of hand. Here, have a seat, and I will explain.'

He pointed at some couches and Kara and I sat down again. Laika sat down opposite of us and crossed his legs.

'I'm truly sorry this has happened to you' he said softly 'I wouldn't want this to happen to anyone and certainly not to you, but there's nothing more we can do.'

'It's ok' I said sharply.

'Dear girl, do you realize you are a tribute in the second annual New Games?' he said 'chances of winning are one in hundred and sixty, not twenty-four. That's six times less. It's absolutely horrible to tell you, but prepare yourselves for the worst.'

'So what? We're tributes, why are we prohibited to hope for the win? Maybe we're prepared to fight!' Kara said.

Laika smiled a little bit. 'That's the spirit.'

It was silent for a while.

Eventually the opened bottles caught his eye. 'Please ask if you want some. You can.'

We nodded. 'When will we arrive?' Flora asked. Laika looked surprised, as if he just realized they were twins.

'About 9 PM. But let's not talk about the future. Tell me your names.'

'Kara' Kara Said

'Flora, and that's Rose' Flora said.

'I'm Abbey.'

He nodded at us one by one, then he spotted Jess. 'What about you?'

'Does it matter?' she cried. She stood up, ran to the bathroom and disappeared.

'That's Jess' I said coldly.

'Why is she so…sad?' Laika asked, having no better words to describe it.

'She is angry because she's in the Games while she isn't one of our friends.' Rose said.

'But that's better, right? No friends to worry about.' He answered.

'We are not, er, particularly nice to her.' Kara murmured.

'So why is she here then?' our escort asked.

'They probably made a mistake' I answered.

'Painful.'

Suddenly the train started moving. I saw the train station disappear. Faster and faster. We were leaving District 1 and heading for the island where the Head City was located, a few hours away.

Rose started sobbing. Laika gave her a tissue.

'So, what just happened?' Kara asked.

'O, there are some problems with Charlotte.' He mumbled. He sighed and continued.

'Your mentor is addicted. Heavily addicted, to morphling. Because she's from Panem she can consume it legally and it's really regrettable that you…were assigned her as a things get out of control and then she's sick or insane…but there's nothing to do.' He added, sounding more powerful: 'I won't let you die, I promise. I'm going to help you as much as I can!'


	4. Chapter 4

'I'm so sorry' Laika repeated 'but okay, we'll be the first to arrive out of all Districts. The last one, I believe 27, will reach the Head City in 3 days from now. You can count on some more attention than others. The second District to arrive is 19 and they will at 4 a.m., so the press will most likely pay way more attention to you. You know, the Head City is exploding with tension because the Games are almost starting again. I'm afraid we'll just have to hang around in the Tribute Center for half a week until the preliminaries will be held.'

I looked outside, where we were just passing some gray hills.

'How many days?' I asked.

Laika was looking at his shoes. 'Five'

I felt the cold wall I had built around me the past years melting away. There was a possibility of being dead by next week. Damn.

'However' he continued 'I am not allowed to give you any tips on what is waiting for you or just regular survival tips. I am an escort, not a mentor.'

'But you know what they are planning?' Rose asked.

'Yes. They've notified all mentors and escorts a few weeks ago about the arenas and everything that goes with them.'

Suddenly I remembered what I promised to Mrs Johnson. I was going to improve my behavior. I would show the good side of me and then I would receive sponsor gifts. I just had to survive the preliminaries so I could show everyone I knew how to behave.

'How old are you?' Laika inquired.

'All seventeen' Kara said.

He nodded and stared at us for a while. 'I think that in case someone proceeds to the actual Games, the stylists will have to do a hell of a job.'

I was offended but I knew I looked like a cheap slut. My hair was too long.

'Well, we'll have a lot of time to get to know each other the following days. I don't want to bother you with the heavy stuff while we're still at the train. Why don't you explore a bit, or watch some television.' He said. I was thankful. I had to distract myself.

Rose and Flora remained sitting on the couch, just staring lifelessly ahead. Jess wasn't there and Kara seemed lost in thought. It was against my whole nature and character to say thank you to Laika, but I still made a small nod. I appeared to be the only one from us who had an urge to move, just like the nature outside did at 200 miles per hour.

I tried to be as quiet as possible while opening the door and creeping into the corridor. I passed a servant – he looked at me as if he wanted to say 'poor girl'. Jesus, they really were planning dreadful things this year.

It was twilight and I was getting nervous. I had to make a good impression while arriving at the Head City. I had to make people like me.

No one liked me. Only Kara did, but she was exactly the same as me. Rose and Flora where light versions of us. Everyone who met me for the first time agreed I was rude and simple. Since I can remember Apparently, when my parents were still alive, I used to be rather normal, but since they died…well, not really.

Again I heard struggling sounds coming from the other side of the corridor. I followed the noise. It sounded like a fight. I put my ear against the thin wall and slowly walked to the door belonging to the cabin where it came from. There was a window in the door, so I peeked through the glass.

'Come on, honey, put the needle down.'

There were two women in the room. One of them was sitting on the ground while the other was hanging in her arms. I shook. The second woman looked so insane and useless it seemed unnatural. She was rolling with her grey eyes, made a weak move with her arm and put an injection needle into the other woman's hands, who put it down behind her.

'Well done, Charlotte.'

I realized I was pressing my nose against the window in tension.

That was our mentor? The weak woman, Charlotte, laid in the other woman's arms while her whole body was trembling and tears were everywhere. Her long, blonde hair was as messy as mine and was everywhere it could reach. Her clothes were dirty. Although she didn't look like it, she could impossible be over 30.

My knees gave up and I sat down on the ground. Did I look like that when I was under influence of morphling? Was I just as insane, lifeless and sleazy? I didn't dare to look. That woman was the only thing we had in the arena.

I buried my head in my hands. Soon after that the door opened. The normal, healthy woman came out and almost tripped over me.

'Oh, who are you? Let me guess, one of the tributes?' she sounded like she regretted it.

'Yes' I felt like I was losing my sanity already. And suddenly I knew what I needed.

The woman walked away. I got up, peeked through the door again and took a deep breath. I knew how to do this. I had to communicate with an under influence Kara sometimes.

I opened the door carefully and walked into my mentors coupé. She was laying on the bed, taking deep breaths, eyes closed. Probably going through the hallicunation-fase. She shook and opened her eyes. It was hard to tell if she was pretty, thanks to the strange facial expression and the messy makeup.

I took one step.

'Miss?' I whispered

She moved her head a little.

'We'll be arriving in an hour or so.' I continued.

'Where?' her voice sounded confused and not present.

'The Head City' I mumbled. Every second I felt sicker than the one before. Why was I doing this?

'Can I…have some?' my common sense screamed at me for saying it, shouting it was stupid, but I was too depressed. Charlotte nodded and I walked carefully to the injection needle that was laying on a table. I stretched my fingers and took it. And as soon as the morphling reached my veins, a warm, tickling feeling spread all over my body. I relaxed immediately and sat down on the ground. The colors were brighter and the silence was so serene it was magical. My mentor was staring at me and I noticed a small smile forming on her thin lips. Everything went quicker than I expected. I felt it coming and then…

I vomited on the floor. I should have known, a voice said in my head, but I couldn't listen to it. Alcohol and morphling wasn't a good combination. My hands were planted in the carpet while puke was everywhere, on my clothes, on the floor.

Charlotte was laughing really softly.

The floor looked so comfortable. I laid down my head. Just nothing going through my thoughts, a moment of relaxation…

The door made a sharp click when it opened and I saw someone enter who slapped her hand against her mouth. It was Jess. Hm, I wanted to hit her, but I didn't want to come up, so I just made a fist with my hand.

She looked at Charlotte, me and the vomit.

'What have you done here?!' she whispered eventually.

I just laughed. Jess got down on her knees and wanted to lift me up.

However, when I felt her hands touching my shoulders, I felt a threat and I hit her. I growled. Somewhere in my mind I knew the morphling made me do horrible things, but I was too weak to fight against it. I clawed her neck and her arms with my nails. Charlotte had fallen off the bed and was laying on the floor, unconscious. I pushed Jess away with all the force I could find. She hit the corner of a closet with her head. She started crying.

Again, more people came in. Some of them ran to Jess to help her get up and take her away while they tried to stop the bleeding on her head. Others picked up Charlotte. But most of them, including someone I recognized as Laika, jumped on top of me. I struggled and moaned, but it didn't matter.

I didn't remember how long ago I took the dose of morphling, but it wasn't a big dose so it wouldn't be long before I was sober again.

I let the people take me outside. Laika told the men to look out for the puddle of vomit. They put me down in another coupé, which was empty apart from some chairs.

Laika was the only one who was with me in the coupé. He gave me a glass of water. I drank it, not realizing how thirsty I actually was. When I was finished he put the glass on the ground, sat down on a chair and folded his arms. I was looking at my feet.

'They will have to stitch the girl's head.' He said.

'Good' I said 'stupid bitch. I hate her.'

Laika suddenly stood up and grabbed my arms tightly. 'Listen' he said 'This can not happen again. You need to take this seriously. This will have consequences. This is about your survival, your life, not about expressing hate in others!'

Ik was ashamed.

'We'll arrive in an hour. Will you be sober then?' he asked. I nodded.

'We need to support Charlotte as good as possible, so she won't make a fool out of herself.'

'Is she ever sober?' I asked high-pitched.

'Rarely. But, Abbey, I wanted to talk to you about you.' Laika mumbled 'are you a morphling addict?'

'Yes' I said truthfully.

'Since when?'

'A couple of years' I whispered 'but I will become a better person, I swear!'

'I will tell you one thing' he said 'please make sure you're sober when you are in public. That will be the most important thing the following days.'

I nodded and knew my face was red. Apart from Mrs Johnson, no one ever talked to me like that. What were these people doing to me, making me behave like this? Maybe it was the promise I made to our school psychologist. And I knew it was very important to keep it, because with Charlotte as our mentor, I couldn't count on decent sponsor gifts. The thought of the unconscious woman frightened me.

'I already told the others, but here are some clothes and a hairbrush, please do something about your appearance, or else we'll be the laughing stock of the Head City and the Capitol.'

He gave me a pile of fabrics.

'I won't look' he grinned, and he turned around.

I smiled, took my clothes off and put the new ones on. They were probably more expensive than all the other clothes I'd ever had.


	5. Chapter 5

I was dizzy and sick when we walked back to the living coupé. Jess, who was sitting on the couch, had a bandage on her head. She looked away. I knew I wasn't allowed to fight anymore, even though I wanted it so much. Kara hugged me.

'We need to stop consuming that stuff' she whispered in my ear.

'We might be dead in a weak' I murmured back.

I sat down and sighed. Somehow everyone looked cleaner. The television was on and showed us crowds cheering on the train station. I looked out of the window, where the twilight landscape was rough. When you wanted to travel to the Head City, the only access was the endless dyke from District 1 to the Head City isle. As long as I could see nature instead of sea, we weren't close yet.

'We are expecting the first train in one hour and a half, just like last year from District 1, and Christ, the crowd is going wild!' the reporter screamed enthusiastically.

Thanks to the morphling I succeeded in remaining somewhat calm, but I was still nervous. How did last year's tributes feel at this moment?

I stared at the screen while I felt the last bit of morphling flowing out of my veins. The depression was coming back. Laika looked at us nervously, as if he was expecting one of us to go wild again.

The door opened and two persons came in: Charlotte and someone who guided her. She was leaning on him, but seemed to be able to stand on herself. She was wearing clean clothes. She looked disoriented, mumbled something and was put in a chair by her guide. She didn't move anymore. Laika cleared his throat, but nothing happened.

Rose, Flora and Kara, who had not seen our mentor yet, seemed shocked.

'What do you think?' Laika whispered in my ear 'Will she be able to walk once we arrive?'

'Probably' I said, after some slight observations. He nodded.

The next time I looked out of the window, it had stopped raining, but there was more water than ever. I saw the stormy, dark sea. We were crossing the big dyke from District 1 to the Head City. I knew that on the other side of this black water mass you'd find Districts 2, 3 and 4. We were going to become world famous in less than an hour. The northern sky was already more orange due to the light pollution. When I noticed some servants looking at me nervously, I grinned.

'God, the effects are over!' I yelled, and everyone looked at me. The servants stopped staring. Laika turned the television volume down.

'Ok, the most important thing to remember once we arrive is to act as normal as possible. We need to get to the cars safely.' He began 'I know I cannot forbid you to use any morphling while we are staying in town, but please, do not touch that stuff anymore. Everyone will be able to see you in a moment. We can count on much attention since we are the first to arrive. I bit my lip and thought of home. We probably passed the borders of District 1 a while ago. On a normal day I would be going to bed.

Charlotte seemed to become more aware of herself every passing minute and sometimes even opened her eyes

Eventually it was Rose who screamed she was able to see the city. We ran to the windows and tried to see what she saw. I pushed Jess away and saw, for the first time in my life, the majestic city I'd seen almost every day on television.

The buildings were, even from this distance it was visible, way bigger than the ones in the Main City of District 1. Countless lights shone on huge structures and on the Avenue of Victory in the midst of all the glamour. We were able to see the blue lake, which seemed a mass of black ink by night. We could see all sorts of car lights on the busy roads.

It was true. The Head City was exploding with tension, it was visible one way or another. I took a deep breath, stared one more time and sat down again. Was I sober enough? Yes, probably. My mind was begging me for more drugs, because my body wanted to calm down, but I had to resist it. I would steal some from Charlotte once we would go to bed tonight.

As soon as the train rode into a tunnel and we couldn't look out of the windows anymore, Laika asked us to get everything we brought from District 1. I realized I didn't take anything, so I was ready.

Laika was supporting Charlotte while we were preparing ourselves to go to the door. Jess was very pale and looked ridiculous with the bandage wrapped around her forehead. On one hand it pleased me but on the other hand it was embarrassing to even think about her parents' reaction, her parents who were probably glued to the television right now.

Kara clutched my arm and the twins followed us to the small space in front of the door. The puddles we created earlier today were cleaned up. We waited. Orange lights from the tunnel flashed by, but the speed was decreasing. We were approaching the train station.

'Try to look happy' Laika advised, while struggling under Charlotte's weight. She was skinny, but still a grown woman. She seemed able to walk though.

Eventually the floor trembled and we knew the train machinist had used the breaks. The train's speed was getting lower and lower. We could already hear the screams and excitement produced by the crowd waiting for us on the near station. Never though people would want to create mosh pits to see me, a stupid tramp from the gross Main City of District 1.

There was a small window in the door, so we were able to see the train station once the train entered it. There was simply too much to see. People, people, more people, peacekeepers and people. I was more anxious than ever and I hold on to the thought of getting morphling soon. Soon…

'The Civilvehicle 1.2 from District 1' a voice announced and the door opened.

Countless lights flashed before my eyes. Camera lenses were pointed at us while journalists and other people were screaming at us. I clutched Kara's arm – I was afraid. It felt like something was pressing on my chest. I didn't know where to look.

Laika pushed me and I held my head up. I did not smile.

'And District 1 has arrived, the second Games have begun, people! It's a group of girls!' everyone was telling each other the same thing.

I stepped out of the train and tried to remain calm and in control. It looked like the peacekeepers got it under control. The mass wasn't a threat to us, though it seemed many people were going crazy at our sight. Wow, this would really become crazy once Indiana, the previous Games' victor, would arrive as District 4s mentor in a day or two.

Jess was last to step out of the train and she seemed embarrassed because of the bandage wrapped around her forehead. I smiled and for the first time I took a pose.

The paparazzi loved it.

Eventually Laika pulled me away to take me to two men who were surrounded by even more peacekeepers. When I saw them it was like getting kicked in the stomach.

One of them was the president. Of course, I should have known that I was going to meet him, but I had not thought about it yet. And now he stood in front of me, this big man who I'd been seeing on television the past years. His thick, black beard was shorter this year.

Next to him stood a long, slim man whom I recognized as Secretary-General and Head Game maker, but I couldn't remember his name. So He was the one responsible for the huge arenas of the past year.

Everyone became very quiet. It was strange. The president smiled.

'Welcome, District 1. As usual, first to arrive.'

He shook Laika's hand and tried to kiss Charlotte's cheek, but she made a strange jump to avoid him. Some peacekeepers wanted to grab her, but the president shook his head. Great publicity.

The president's hand was big and warm when I shook it. On the contrary, the Head Gamemaker's hand was ice cold. While he grabbed my hand, he suddenly pulled me closer and whispered in my ear: 'I heard about the incident with the other girl in the train. I could execute you, you know, but actually, I like it.' He pointed at Jess.

I was petrified during a few moments, but then I smiled. I decided to take it as a compliment and stepped back.

I noticed the press was very aware of Jess' bandage, but they had no idea why she had to wear it or who injured her. Considering the Head Gamemaker's whisper I didn't have fear yet, but they would kill me anyway once we were in the arena.

We left the platform and entered the station hall, which was enormous. A huge portrait of the president was hanging on one of the walls. The ceiling was so high it looked like the night sky because the ceiling was made of glass and it was half past eight. This morning I woke up on the street. Tonight I would sleep in a sweet bed.

Outside of the building there were even more people waiting. It had been rainy and grey in District 1, but it was pretty warm here.

There were two cars waiting for us. Automatically I walked to the first one and pushed Jess away when she tried to follow me. Her eyes were teary again and she got into the other car. Laika looked at me angrily and got in the other car too. The doors closed. While the car drove away I looked to the train station's exterior. It was gorgeous. Everything was amazing.

The Head City resembled the Capitol, because the Capitol was the one who built the Head City. Enormous, majestic buildings were towering sky high, big bridges with loads of traffic crossed the blue river, fireworks in the air and in the middle of the city a huge waterfall.

Suddenly I thought of the moment I pushed Jess away in front of the car. The camera's probably saw it. This wasn't a good start. I had to behave well.

I had used morphling in the train. I had hit one of my Districts tributes. Nope, this really wasn't a good start.

**Hey everyone, sorry for the mistakes I made. I won't update in a while, I'm going to Austria in a few days, but I'll be back within three weeks!**


	6. Chapter 6

Although it was busy on the road, we were able to make it to the Tribute Center without any delays. I noticed some cars on the highway didn't have wheels, they were floating half a meter above the asphalt. We didn't have those in District 1, and certainly not in the Main City. Maybe they had them in the richest Districts, like 5 or 9.

Eventually our car stopped. I got out and saw a huge high building in front of me. It was located on a hill, so we had a dazzling view on the enormous city beneath us. The building was surrounded by some sort of garden with strange plants.

'Welcome' Laika said 'we are the first to enter the Tribute home.'

'The first this year' Jess remarked. I knew she was right. Last year, right before the first edition, this building must have been stuffed with children who were all dead now, apart from one. Suddenly the building seemed like a ghost house, haunted by the spirits of 159 dead tributes.

Laika raised an eyebrow, offered Charlotte his arm and dragged her to the entrance. She looked like she was half asleep. I sighed. We probably had to be grateful to have a really nice escort, because our mentor was useless.

The hall was big, empty and white. There were a couple of lifts in the corner. A woman approached us.

'Welcome, District 1. The first, as usual? You're on floor 8 this year.' She said, while putting a tick on a paper sheet in her hand.

'Hi, Tiara. New job?' Laika grinned. The woman, Tiara, looked up and seemed to become afraid. Her lips started to tremble and she turned around. Within a few seconds she had disappeared.

Laika ignored it and pushed us to the lifts. He pressed the button with 8 on it and the doors closed. I felt butterflies in my stomach while the lift moved. After some time the doors opened again and we entered the apartment.

Every room I had visited so far in the Head City had amazed me. Again I was blown away by the huge loft with several staircases and awesome views through huge windows and enough bedrooms for everyone. I slowly walked around while I tried to touch everything. OK, we were tributes, but this was amazing. I had never seen anything like this. Did anyone in District 1 live like his? Probably not. Maybe only the richest of all, like Mrs. Johnson.

'Your bedrooms are upstairs. Choose one, spend the rest of the evening as you like. I will try and see if I can get Charlotte to bed.' Laika announced.

Kara and I ran upstairs and got neighboring rooms. I opened the door and ran into my new and final bedroom. It was a big, airy room with a bed and everything I wanted. The windows were huge. I walked to the glass and stared out of the windows for a while.

We were on the eighth floor, but it was still pretty high. Would it be possible to kill myself by jumping out of the windows? Probably not, there was probably a force field or something.

I took off my clothes and wandered to the big wardrobe. There was a lot in there, including a training suit with the number 1 on the back. Apparently they had already made one for everyone, regardless of your performance in the preliminaries. I shivered by the thought of the preliminaries. I'd rather participate in the Hunger Games than the preliminaries. Last year I didn't see a lot of the New Games, but I did see the preliminaries. The idea of being lost in a maze together with over hundred people wanting to kill you was horrible.

Would there be a maze again this year?

Slowly I walked back to my bed and climbed on it. While I was trying to fall asleep, my fingers were playing with the silk blankets.

I had to win these games. I wanted silk stuff for the rest of my life. I had loads of experience at hand to hand combat, even though I never killed anyone nor used a weapon. How hard could it be? Humans were horrible creatures and one less didn't matter. I stared at the ceiling and felt my eyes were closing.

I woke up when I heard a car. The sound was closer than the vague noise the cars on the highways in the City made all night long. I scratched my head, got out of my bed and wandered to the windows. It was still dark and probably around 4 o'clock. Down at the square in front of the Tribute Center there were two vehicles, the same as the ones we used to get here. I tried to think with my sleepy mind and after a while I realized this had to be the delegates of District 19, who would be second to arrive at the Head City. I stood there for a while and watched a group of girls, five of them, getting out of the cars. They were just like us.

Unlike Panem, where reapings were all held on the same day, the New Continent had decided to spread them over three days, so that every few hours there would be a train so the people wouldn't be bored. District 19 was one of the most far away Districts in East, so these girls must have been on their train for at least two or three days. And they were all going to die.

The idea of the building not being completely deserted apart from us anymore, was a comforting thing. I got into bed again and enjoyed a night without a single dream. Tomorrow I was going to use so much Morphling I would forget everything.

When I woke up, it was sunny in my room. I stretched my legs, opened my eyes and got out of bed. When I realized I was in the Head City, it felt like someone was pushing on my chest. Four days until the preliminaries.

I heard some noises coming from the living room, but I didn't feel like going down to the others. Eventually I decided to take a shower. There were lots of buttons in the cabin – different kinds of foam and scents. I tried them all.

I put something on I had found in my wardrobe and threw my old clothes in a corner. The servants would clean it up.

Jess was watching television in the living room. I rolled my eyes when she looked over her shoulder and I walked to the dining table, where I saw some newspapers. We were on the front page. My pimples were clearly visible, I thought bitterly. Then a small article at the corner of the page caught my eye.

_Yesterday night when the delegation of District 1 arrived, one of them, Jess Woods, 16, appeared to have injured her head during the train ride. These incidents are not supposed to happen and that is why there will be an investigation on this one, which possibly could harm the reputation of escort Laika Devon. _

I inhaled and exhaled deeply before I put the paper down. Jesus, what was the matter? Then I grinned by the thought of Head City officials blaming Laika for Jess' injury. That would be a good thing for me. I snatched a doughnut from a plate and made my way upstairs again. I started to creep when I approached Charlotte's room. Once I had reached her room I opened the door so carefully no one would be able to hear it.

'Boo' someone whispered. I shook and hit my head against the wall. I saw Kara standing behind me with a big smile on her face.

'You gave me a heart attack, stupid cow!' I murmured.

'What are you going to do?' She asked.

'What do you think? Getting Morphling of course. Otherwise I won't be able to function normally today.'

Charlotte was in a deep sleep when we got into the room. 'I want some too' Kara said.

We crept to the drawers and opened some.

'Here it is' Kara whispered. I walked to her on my toes and saw a drawer stuffed with the stuff we were looking for. I laughed and imagined the free-from-sorrow-feeling we were going to experience in a few moments.

We were able to relax and one way or another we were able to hide our use from Laika and Jess. My pulse was steady and I spent most of the afternoon in front of the television, watching District trains arriving on the train station, one almost every two hours. Most of them weren't really interesting. A mixture of boys, girls and sometimes groups consisting of both. They all seemed nervous like us last night. Seeing those faces was painful. Some of them were really young, maybe thirteen. I was very fearful when I was their age – I was living on the streets and every day was one to survive.

The press was looking forward to the arrival of District 4 tomorrow morning. Everyone wanted to see their tributes and of course last year's winner, Indiana, who would be mentoring these tributes. I was pretty curious too. Last year's games were extravagant and revolutionary. I was wondering if she was still sane after experiencing. Maybe she would get out of that train and turned out to have become a Morphling addict.

The Tribute Center was full of life. Around 4 o'clock in the afternoon we heard footsteps on the ceiling, which meant that District 20 had been assigned the ninth floor. They were all boys, around fourteen years old.

I kept hanging on the couch with Kara, watching an enthusiastic reporter telling us about District 34. It was depressing watching that crap. Rose and Flora were in their room. I felt sorry for them. Maybe I was going to survive the preliminaries, but they certainly were not.

At six we were called for dinner.

When I saw the dishes on the table, I almost got dizzy. Some of them I had never seen before, some of them only in films. When Laika saw my astonished face, he laughed.

There were six of us at the dinner table, because Charlotte wasn't there. I had to remind myself of the fact that the only reason I was able to remain calm was that I was under influence of Morphling. The thought of not having it close was terrifying, but I also felt horrible about stealing it from our mentor.

I put a salad with tiny pink fruits in it on my plate and got my fork. Then I ate it like a farmer would and burped. Kara giggled and Jess seemed uncomfortable.

'Maybe you should take this all seriously' Laika said angrily 'this isn't just a game, ok? Tomorrow we are going to watch uncensored footage of the first games and then you will be deciding what will be your survival tactic!'

His stare was so intense we became frightened. He wasn't our mentor, but still very dedicated to keeping us alive.

I shut up and listened to the other girls' conversation. None of the talking was about the Games.

After dinner we watched TV again. They were expecting District 8. We were so used to seeing tributes arrive it got boring. I felt like hitting something to get rid of my anger.

'Are we allowed in the training center?' I asked Laika.

He shook his head.

'Only if you survive the preliminaries. I for certain can't go in at all times, only Charlotte can, so if you make it to the Games, you'll have to train on your own.'

'Oh, I'll figure something out.' I murmured. Probably not.

I was walking in circles in the living room when I promised myself to survive the preliminaries. I was going to succeed in this task – killing a person wasn't that hard. If it was necessary to save my own life, it would even be a good thing.

I felt a pain in my heart when I realized my win would cost Kara's life. I shivered by the thought of last year's finale.

It was unexpected that two people from the same District had to compete in the finale. Reactions to it were mixed, it was well-received in the Head City but the Districts weren't too happy with it. Two friends who became enemies during the Games fought and Indiana won and Poppy lost. Lovely, in Head City terms.

I pushed the thought away, because the scenario was so unlikely to happen again.

Evening fell and our first day in the Head City had ended. We didn't do anything, but I didn't care. I had my daily dose of Morpling in my veins, which kept me going. Otherwise I would have kicked something, Jess or something

**Oh my God it took l-o-n-g before I finally had enough time to put another chapter up! Snowboarding, a debate conference and exam week distracted me from everything related to my story. Sorry for that and all my mistakes this chapter :)**


	7. Chapter 7

Jess had spent the day crying in her room. Laika was busy the whole day; comforting her, talking to us and preparing for the Games. It was exhausting and irritating.

Around midnight I went to Kara's room and we talked for a while.

'So, is this the life that you meant when you said it had to become better?' I asked.

'I will only get this life if I win' She said.

'Yeah' I said, while turning on my back, 'but winning seems so…impossible'

It was silent for a moment.

'We do have some advantages, you know, compared to other kids from West. We have been starving and fighting. That matters, right? That has to make a difference.' It almost seemed like she was begging me to say yes.

'I hope so' I said. Tributes from East definitely had a few advantages on survival, but some of them were in such a bad condition entering the Games they were just to weak to simply run, which was something easy for children from West. However, the place where we lived, the Main City of District 1, was almost the poorest of the whole Continent.

'Are you going to win, Abbey?' Kara asked.

'Not on the cost of your life. Not like last year. We are not going to part, ok? I think it's best if Rose and Flora die silently in the preliminaries so we don't have to worry about them.' I said.

'Well, we have to survive the preliminaries first.' She laughed.

I stared out of the window, looking at the dark orange sky. There were no stars because of the light pollution.

'Well, we must be able to train ourselves somehow..' I eventually asked.

'We'll have to do it ourselves.' She replied.

The next morning I woke up at dawn. I turned around, hit my pillow, but couldn't go back to sleep again. It was hot in my room. It was always summer in the Head City, but the temperatures were moderate and perfectly good. I once heard it could be forty degrees celsius in the southern Districts. In District 1 it was never more than twenty.

I had a light headache when I raised and didn't feel like doing something today. However, I stood up, put some clothes on and went to the living room, where the television was on as usual. I grabbed a muffin and sunk down on the couch.

After a few minutes it got through to me that this hour or the next they were expecting the train from District 4 with last year's winner on board, who would be presenting herself as a mentor. That was a weird idea. That chick, how old was she, sixteen? One year younger than me. But this sixteen year old was probably more useful than Charlotte.

Although it was still early the crowd on the screen was bigger than ever and even more enthusiastic. I sighed, fetched the newest paper from the table, crossed my legs and read some articles. I skipped the first ten pages about the newest tributes until I saw a picture of us in the corner. The article was about ways of travelling from District 1 to the Head City, but when I saw the last line, I felt something heavy in my stomach.

'_The investigation on the injuries of tribute Jess Woods is still running but is temporary delayed because of a lack of possibilities to hear some people out.' _

Would Mrs. Johnson know I did it? Probably yes. Suddenly I remembered what the Head Gamemaker said to me on the train station. He knew. Why didn't he help the investigation?

The paper was filled with crappy articles on dieting, interviews with stylists, upcoming events and a huge announcement of the preliminaries. Eventually I put the paper down and tried to watch some television again.

After about a quarter a train, somewhat bigger than ours, drove into the station. District 4. The peacekeepers had difficulties oppressing the crowd and protecting the important people. The president was present, along with his secretary general/gamemaker.

'They're boys!' a reporter shouted 'I can see them through the windows!'

Apparently people were expecting a lot from District 4s tributes. As if they were going to win twice in a row. When they got out of the train I couldn't help thinking that probably wasn't going to be the case. They were pale, slim and younger than me. No winners.

However, most of the people thought that of _her_ last year.

I turned the television volume down then Indiana appeared. I hadn't seen that much of her games, but even I knew that, after only eleven months of being the first victor, she had been operationally corrected and perfected. Her eyes were bigger, the skin seemed somehow tighter and smoother. It looked disturbing and unnatural. The idea of a sixteen year old being forced to have plastic surgery was unethical and wrong.

She smiled and stepped on the platform. The Head City had their winner back –someone with more prestige than every single winner of the last twenty years in Panem. I wondered if the Capitol was jealous.

I watched District 4 cross the platform, get welcomed by the president and the Head Gamemaker and then they disappeared in a car. They would be here in half an hour. I turned the TV off and laid back. It didn't sound healthy, but here I was, in the Head City as a tribute for the second Games, _bored as hell._ I had nothing to do until the medical checks tomorrow.

I hadn't noticed Rose had taken a seat next to me.

'Hey' I said. She mumbled something.

'I think we should be grateful.' I said eventually.

'For what?' she asked.

'For not being best friends for years.'

I could clearly imagine how horrible it would be to be in the Games with four or five of your best friends. The only good friend that came here with me was Kara. We've been hanging out with Rose and Flora for not even half a year and Jess wasn't even a friend.

'That doesn't make it less atrocious' she said.

'I wanna win' I said 'I've got to have a chance?'

'Kill people?' Rose asked.

'Yes' I said 'There's 160 of them, many are willing to kill. The bigger your chances of survival are if you do.'

'Even if you survive the preliminaries you haven't achieved anything yet, last year the most horrible arenas still had to come.' She smiled 'which one did you think was the worst?'

'The one in District 31, probably. Those face-to-face things. I hope they won't do those this year.' I said.

'I am going to protect Flora as much as I can' she remarked.

'Only one can win.' I said coldly. She looked at me angrily.

'I'm sorry' I murmured and embraced her when she started crying.

'At least you have a chance' she sobbed 'we don't. What will mom do if we are not there anymore? She'll have to prostitute herself!'

'Winning will make me happy.' I whispered.

'No' she said 'Just you wait.'

Suddenly we heard something. We looked over our shoulders, turned the television volume down and saw how the elevator doors opened.

Some people came in. A few of them were wearing a uniform.

'Hi' said the woman in front of them. I recognized her, but I didn't know why.

'We are here to take your sizes, because your stylists wanted to know them already in case one of your survives the preliminaries.' She said, and pointed at the team behind her. They were pretty normal people.

The woman looked tense.

'Where are the others?' One of the members of the team asked.

'Upstairs' I said. Three men walked to the stairs with their tapelines in their hands and disappeared. Two others came to Rose and me.

The man ordered me to lift up my arms. I obeyed.

While they did their thing, I asked: 'Why can't they wait with this shit until after the preliminaries? It would save a lot of effort'

The woman looked annoyed because of my rudeness, and suddenly I knew why she looked familiar. She was the one who welcomed us in the Tribute Center, I believe she was called Tiara. I knew I wasn't supposed to become even ruder, but I still did.

'Why were you afraid of Laika?' I asked.

The angry grin on her face disappeared and she became pale.

'He's asleep, right? I assumed he wasn't out of bed yet' she said with a husky voice. The tapeline almost cut my belly.

'He's still asleep' confirmed Rose, clearly interested.

Tiara buried her face in her hands and took a deep breath. 'Hurry up' she told the people with the tapelines.

'To answer your first question, why we are doing this' she began 'Prul is used to maintaining a strict schedule -'

'Who's Prul?' I interrupted.

'He may become your stylist' she snarled 'and your second question; I'd rather have no contact with Laika for the rest of my life. He destroyed me.'

'Why?' Rose asked.

'That's none of your business! But I'm telling you this' she murmured 'make sure you are never, ever, alone in the same room with him'

She wanted to say more, but the other members of the team came back from upstairs. I wanted to know what Tiara had to say, but they left so rapidly I'd probably never know. It was silent again.

'Do you believe her?' Rose eventually asked.

'We can't afford to' I said 'Certainly not with a mentor like Charlotte.'

We sat down, while we heard the car of District 4 stop on the square downstairs.

**I cannot believe how busy I have been. Exams, conferences, debates, competitions, amnesia :$, skiing etc. I wish I could give you all a huge cake.**


	8. Chapter 8

'Abbey, Abbey! Wake up!' Kara was pulling my arm. 'We need to go. We will be late for the health checks.'

'Okay' I said sleepily. I was sweating because of the heat around me, but I managed to get out of bed. Everyone was waiting downstairs. Rose, Flora and Jess clearly didn't dare to complain, but Laika gave me a lecture while in the elevator.

'…Need to take authority serious…tomorrow you won't be that happy…attitude'

I wasn't listening at all. The hall on the ground floor was filled with tributes and their mentors. Charlotte was half asleep. She had used morphling again. I couldn't help staring when Indiana passed with her group and their escort, a lady in her forties.

We were pushed to a car so we didn't have time to look at all the other tributes. Tomorrow only a quarter of them would be alive. All of them were still nameless to me.

There was an awkward silence when we were driving on busy roads. Laika had taken place in an other car so I could finally say what I wanted to Jess, who was sitting next to me.

'There's a spot on your shirt. I think it's from lunch' She said eventually.

'Thanks for noticing, stupid cow' I said harshly 'shut the fuck up'

She obeyed and remained silent for the rest of the way.

It turned out that the health checks were done in a big, steel building outside of the Head City. It was some sort of laboratory. When we were in the hall, Laika told us to stop walking.

'Ok, I will leave you here. We are not allowed in. Charlotte and I will wait here, along with all the other mentors and escorts.'

We said goodbye and Kara and I proceeded the other three while opening a door which should lead us to the checks. When we see what's behind it, our mouths drop.

A huge hall, maybe three gymnasiums, is in front of us. It is rather dark and the only light comes from tubes on the ceiling. There were no windows but a lot of doors. The place was crowded with the other tributes. They were sitting on benches or nervously walking around. I entered the hall, timid and scared, and sat down on the first bench I saw.

'Maya Dubrovnik, District 23, door 6 please' a robotic voice called. The voice came from speakers everywhere on the walls. I shook. I looked around the space, but it was too big and crowded to be able see neither where Maya Dubrovnik was nor where she was going.

'Nice. It would be nice if they'd explained this stuff' Rose said. Flora nodded.

I was staring at the other tributes. It was a mix of everything. Little thirteen-year olds, big eighteen-year olds, girls, boys, slender, anorexic, fat. You could easily divide them into West and East – children from East were thinner, smaller and unhealthier, although I knew some of them must be as good as hand-to-hand combat as I was. But then again, they looked like I would break their arm if I touched them.

The Head City and the Capitol desperately tried to hide the extreme poverty in East, without success. We knew little about the other Districts, but we did know the conditions in which the Eastern lived in. Certainly when you came from the Main City of District 1. In that case you _experienced _them.

Time flew by. Once in a minute, a name was called. Some of them were strange and ridiculous ('Inuit…Park…Ukrin…Jogh…Zakaria…'), others pretty normal ('Hayden…Annika…Justin…Michael…'). By the time the first one of us, Flora, was called, the hall was half empty and we could see there the people called were going.

Flora didn't come back after she disappeared behind door 2. Five minutes later Kara was called. Nerves were kicking in. What if those doctors saw how much morphling I had used over the years? What if they saw I'd used it while staying here in the Head City?'

'Abbey Kingsleigh, District 1, door 1 please.'

I tried to breathe steadily while standing up. I looked around and saw door 1, hundred meters away on the other side of the room. Children were staring at me while I passed. Most of them would be dead by tomorrow.

The doorknob was cold. I opened the door and went into the room. Inside it was even darker than in the big hall. The only light came from a couple of lamps on the wall. The light was white and cold. In front of me was a table with three people wearing lab coats sitting behind it.

'Hello' said the man in the middle. He was older than the other two. 'District 1?'

'Yes' I said. 'Have a seat.' Said the man.

I walked to the table and sat down on the cold chair. On the table were notebooks, papers and other stationary.

After they measured and weighted me, they made me fill in some tests. After I finished a woman gave me a pill.

'What's this?' I asked.

'It will delay your period for at least two months' said the woman without any embarrassment 'We are giving them to every female'.

'Oh' I said. They gave me a glass of water and I swallowed. It was disgusting. 'Well, you can go now' ordered the man. I stood up and wanted to go.

'Stop, wait. Why do we detect unusual things in your blood? The device says so' I heard behind my back. One of the three was holding a little thing with my blood sample in it. It was probably electronic.

'I have no idea' I said. Then I rushed out of the room.

When I came back, the big gym-like space was emptier than before. Kara was still waiting to be called. While I was walking to her, I imagined last year's tributes all sitting here. The idea that that really happened, exactly a year ago, was frightening. Their thoughts, their hearts still beating. All hoping for that one place in the kingdom of the living.

'How did it go?' Kara asked.

'Meh. Not really that special. They found the Morphling in my blood though, you need to watch out.' She nodded and said I had to go outside to look for Laika, Charlotte, Flora, Rose and Jess, who were all waiting in the entrance hall of the building. I said goodbye and good luck.

I did find the others in the entrance hall, like Kara said.

'Everything OK?' Laika asked.

'Yeah' I said 'I mean, they didn't ask me to take of my clothes or something, so that went better than expected.'

Charlotte suddenly laughed, high-pitched and completely insane. Laika grinned.

The day was ending. Orange beams of sunlight falling through the windows became weaker. Maybe the last sunlight I would ever see. However, I seemed less nervous than the others. Finally Kara came back and we drove back to the Tribute Center. We had dinner.

'So. Maybe the very last meal we share all together' Laika said while I was killing a lamb stew with my fork. 'All I can say is that you were an interesting group and I hope the odds will be in your favor tomorrow. Competition's gonna be tough though. Don't underestimate them. In the preliminaries everything you have is your brutality and your strength.'

I glanced at Kara. We knew we were definitely stronger than Jess and the twins. I was hoping really badly that Kara would survive, so we could just have some more weeks together. Maybe two. Not more. One of us would finally be dead at the end of the Games.

'I know some of you enjoyed your stay here more than the others…' continued Laika. I smiled wickedly and thought of my behavior towards Jess. Still I couldn't help feeling some very slight regret. Very slight.

'…and I cannot express how sorry I feel for you.' His voice was nothing more than a whisper.

'Are you allright?' Kara asked.

'I'm s-sorry' he mumbled 'This are the hardest moments of all. I'm glad I might be you of any help the past days. I just- thinking of last year, those poor boys, they were only seventeen…just like you.'

This was the first time he'd said something about District 1's tributes of the previous year. Only one of them survived and made it 'till, I don't know, maybe halfway the first arena before he was killed by that brute from District 2.

'There were five of them, and I know it was already huge that one of them survived, but it still hurts, you know? Well, not even for me, but also for him, for Lex. Losing four friends in one day isn't just something you can take.'

Everyone was silent. It was awkward and I focused on cutting my stew. I was happy when Charlotte decided to quit the table and stumble to the stairs to disappear in her bedroom.

'Anyway' our escort said 'Maybe you want to go to bed to get a good rest or just hang around before you leave.'

Almost everyone left. I was the last one to be sitting at the table together with Laika. He smiled. 'You don't seem that nervous for tomorrow.'

'I know I can do this' I said 'I haven't done anything else for the past ten years of my life but fight with people and provoke them.'

'I must say; I trust you'll survive this. It isn't going to be easy, but I think you can do it too.'

'Hey, thanks' I said. Suddenly I remembered the woman, Tiara, this morning and I became uncomfortable. Maybe it was time I went to bed too.

'Goodnight' I said.

'What? Don't you wanna stay and talk?' he asked.

'No, thanks. Need to prepare.' I stood up and went upstairs. I opened a door without any thinking. Shit, this was Jess' room. She was sitting on her bed and looked up.

'What do you want?' she whispered.

'Nothing. Why would I?' I said. I turned around.

It's now or never, said a strange voice in my head. Now or never to approve your behavior.

'Jess?' I murmured. I felt my face becoming red and for the first time in my life I felt genuinely ashamed and intimidated. Then I hardened myself.

'I want to apologize' I began 'For my behavior to you for the past years and especially these days.' I couldn't believe I was doing this. 'I've been a complete hell for you and I have harmed you and I know your life sucked because of me.'

The vulnerability was killing me. This was nothing like me. But I had to keep Mrs. Johnson in mind. When in the arena I would show her I was able to make good, ethical and social decisions. Her sponsor gifts could save my damn life, especially after seeing Charlotte behave. And now I was opening up my soul to the most pathetic girl I knew.

Jess' eyes narrowed. She put the book she was reading down and got off her bed.

'What?' I said.

She sighed. 'Do you really think I'm going to take this crap?' she said 'You've tormented me for so many years now and even now that those years are suddenly running out you became even worse. You've injured me, verbally assaulted me, and you think I will accept your sudden apology?'

I felt anger coming up. 'Listen, you little whore. This is maybe the first time I tried to be nice to you. This is really something big for me, ok?'

Jess stepped forward. 'I said apology not accepted. Too bad you don't have time to figure out how to make truthful apologies since we are all going to die this month or the next. Maybe my time will come sooner than yours but I just want you to know it.'

I couldn't bring myself to being nice again. 'I hope you die in the arena!' It was the meanest I could come up with in a time like this.

Jess took another step so she was almost nose to nose with me. She was exactly my height. 'I'd rather die in the arena than accept your apology.'

Her injured forehead was clearly visible. 'You are so wrong' I whispered.

'Maybe. But someday everything we do will be judged, Abbey Kingsleigh, and I know you will burn in hell that day.'

When I raised my hand to slap her, she just said 'do it'. I did. She fell on her back.

I turned around and closed the door. Furious, I kicked a wall and the painting hanging on it fell on the ground. The glass frame shattered and made a lot of noise. I went into my bedroom and for the first time in a very long period I cried. Tears were running over my cheeks and dripping on the ground. I couldn't bring myself to stealing more Morphling, but the idea was tempting. I was exhausted and fell asleep on my sheets without even taking off my clothes.

**Preliminaries in the next chapter!**


	9. Chapter 9

I woke up early that morning. The first few seconds I couldn't remember why I was feeling so down, but then I realized today was preliminaries day. In 24 hours most of this building would be empty and at least half of the people on this floor would be gone.

I was still wearing the clothes I wore yesterday, but I didn't care. All I needed was a good pair of running shoes. I got out of bed, pressed some buttons on a device and opened the curtains. They revealed some weak sunlight creeping over the mostly sleeping city. I stumbled to the shoes part of the closet, which I had never opened before, and started raiding. Most of the pairs were high heels imbedded with jewels or something, but after a minute I managed to find a pair of sneakers that would do. It was hard to tie my shoelaces with a mind so empty.

I went downstairs. The only person already present at breakfast was Kara. I sat down next to her and all she said was: 'promise this isn't the end'.

'It isn't, for both of us' I responded, and ate some stuff I didn't recognize. It tasted like peanut butter with cheese or something and it was disgusting.

The next person to join our company was Charlotte. She seemed confused and depressed, but not under influence. Kara said hello but she didn't respond.

'So, what should we do today?' I asked. Charlotte looked up, disturbed.

'How should I know? Just survive it' she said 'at least _you _can'

'Us?' asked Kara. Our mentor nodded. 'Yes, you. I don't care about those other chicks, even I can see they suck'

I was slightly offended. I mean, she could say that kind of stuff to Jess anytime but not about the twins. I ate the rest of my food while the rest of the company arrived.

'I've been watching footage of all the other tributes all night' Laika said, looking extremely fatigued. 'You can expect some pretty tough competition, various Districts have a healthy group of seventeen year olds like you. There are not many very young tributes this year, maybe three or four groups of thirteen year olds.'

The idea of being dead in a few hours still hadn't reached me. I was determined to survive. And when Laika announced it was time to say goodbye to the apartment for now, I didn't. Rose, Flora and Jess looked unhealthy, pale, anxious and their limbs were trembling when we got in the elevator to go down. We would go to the preliminaries by hovercraft. I had never seen one in real life, let stand travelled by one. In the hall it was busy and we could already see the press waiting behind large gates in the courtyard. I saw them pushing to get a good picture of the 160 tributes boarding the hovercraft. I didn't know where we were going, actually. The preliminaries were in a maze on the other side of the Head City isle last year. Now they had a different concept, so a different place. I heard they were using the maze as a tourist attraction, just like they did with the arenas in Panem. Atrocious idea.

I pushed some tributes in the mass waiting to enter the big hole in the hovercraft aside to be one of the first to take place. We were led to a large, long sort of corridor with chairs attached to both walls. Apparently there was room for everyone, but I doubted it. I dragged Kara through a group of little girls to get her to two empty seats. We took place and waited. It was noisy, crowded and hot in the hovercraft. Most tributes were looking ill. The bony ones from East even more. A black-haired boy took place next to me and opposite of me sat one of the little girls we pushed. She looked afraid. I was trying to feel sorry for them, trying to imagine how the tributes who knew they hadn't a single chance were feeling, but I couldn't.

Eventually most of the seats were filled. Rose and Flora were all on the other side and I didn't know where Jess was. Didn't care, though.

'Dear tributes, please put your safety belts on' an announcer said.

Yeah, right. Safety belts for kids they were going to kill. The irony. I put mine on and waited.

After a few moments I felt the hovercraft moving and the small windows, the only source of light in the steel space, were darkened immediately.

People wearing uniforms came in and did something to the tributes on the other side of the corridor I couldn't see properly, but when they came closer I saw they were putting some sort of bracelets around the tributes' wrists. For the first time today I felt some nerves and I fetched Kara's hand. When one of the people reached us she brutally ripped our hands apart and put the bracelet around my wrist. It was a strange metal thing with a small timer indicating ten minutes left. As soon as the uniformed lady was gone I tried to take it off, but it was impossible somehow. It was too tight. I saw many children trying to move it, but it was absolutely not possible. The timer scared me. After a few minutes every tribute was supplied with a bracelet and the automatic voice started talking again.

'Dear tributes, welcome to the second annual New Games. We are pleased to witness your motivation and life force. Today you are writing history by competing in the preliminaries, where we'll get to know the select few who prove themselves worthy to compete in the next round; the actual Games. Now, as you may have already noticed you have all received a special device made by the finest technicians our City has. We'll come back to that later.'

I was staring at the girl in front of me, who was still trying to get it off.

'This year we want to stay close to the City who leads this whole operation; our magnificent Head City. That is why we designed a suitable arena. You will be competing in-'

I heard everyone holding their breaths. '…a skyscraper.'

Countless whispers flew around the room. 'How are they going to do that?' I asked Kara.

'Yes, a very high building with a hundred and sixty floors, so one for each tribute to start on. You are free to move around the building, use elevators and stairs, hide under desks or behind bookshelves, but here comes the twist and the connection with your time-bracelets: you are not allowed to stay on the same floor for longer than ten minutes. In other words, you need to move around constantly. Your timer will indicate how long you have left. If you don't move to another floor within ten minutes, there's a nasty catch. Each bracelet contains a tiny but very powerful bomb which will explode and kill you guaranteed. Also, if you try to take it off by yourself it will explode too. So be careful!'

Now almost everyone who was trying to rip off their bracelet stopped. I felt some sweat welling up. Even I was afraid now. I looked at the innocent looking watch-like thing. It was giving me an evil silver sparkle.

'Your starting floor will be completely random, so don't expect to find your friend one floor below you. You'll hear a cannon every time a contestant is out of the running. We'll put their photo up on every computer screen in the building. It is now half past ten in the morning. You'll start at ten. At four in the afternoon we hope to meet the brave competitors of the second annual New Games. Good luck and may the odds be ever in your favor'

There was a deadly silence in the room. Even I didn't want to speak to Kara. I felt even more nerves coming up. Shit just got real. Now was the time.

We flew for about ten minutes of so. It couldn't be that far away. And when the hovercraft started descending, a lot of people seemed to become really sick this time.

We all felt the hovercraft touching the ground and after a few seconds it stood still.

Suddenly people from the other side of the corridor started screaming. I saw people wrestling in their chairs but they were unable to move. Even more panic broke out. I couldn't see what they were so afraid of until I smelled it. Gas. It was gas. They were pumping gas in the space.

I grabbed Kara's hand when I saw people around us falling asleep.

'We'll see each other soon' I said 'very soon'

'Be brave, Abbey' she whispered. I noticed my thoughts were getting slower and slower and my head was getting heavy. No, I mustn't fall asleep, they can't make me, sleeping gas…

I felt Kara's grip loosening. 'No, no, come on' my voice was no more than a whisper too. I saw everyone around me sleeping until my own eyes closed and didn't open anymore.

Everything was so light. Featherlike. I wanted to move my limbs, but I didn't feel anything. I opened my eyes and realized I was laying my side, like an unborn child. What was going on?

I couldn't identify the room I was in. I didn't recognize the strange furniture. There was a boring, wooden floor. I placed my hands on it and pushed myself up. I was dizzy and colors were everywhere. Strange sounds were flowing through my ears. They hurt me. I saw a chair, tried to walk in a straight line to it but I couldn't. I fell on the ground again and had to drag myself to the object. Once I reached it, I sighed, crawled up and sat down.

The room finally took a realistic shape. It was some sort of office. An office? Yes, there were desks and things that looked like computers, and there were windows!

I buried my face in my hands, tried to clear my mind and tried to recall where I was or what I was doing here. I had to get to the windows. I stood up, reached for a wall and slowly moved to the window while touching the solid stone wall. Ok, this was some strange shit.

I almost tripped over something laying on the ground – an axe, what the hell was that doing there- and while taking little, careful steps I wandered through the glass, nervous and curious at the same time.

Water. Sea, ocean everywhere. A dazzling height. All I could see from the window was a grey mass of high waves. I was in a high building on a really small island, something really high, on one of the highest floors, I was…in a skyscraper.

My hand automatically touched my wrist and slowly I lifted it up. The steel bracelet was still there. Holy shit. Jesus Christ. The fucking preliminaries. 1:27, 1:26, 1:25. It was ticking away.

It took me a few seconds to realize I had to get the hell out of here. Now. I had a minute to get to another room or floor. My heart was beating so fast it wasn't normal anymore. I was seeing black spots when I started running. Where was the way out? Where were the stairs? I was looking for neon green emergency exit thingies, like we had them in District 1, but when I finally found one I remembered the axe where I almost tripped over. That was my weapon. I had to get back and get it. I turned around, ran as fast as I could to the place where I woke up and reached for the axe. I grabbed it, ran into a random direction. Thirty seconds left. I saw I door I hadn't seen before, sprinted to it, prayed that it wasn't locked…and it wasn't. It opened without any difficulties. Thank God, there was a ladder. Fifteen seconds. I jumped on the ladder, tried to hold the axe in my one hand while climbing with the others. The climb seemed to last forever. Then I saw the next floor, gave all I had and threw myself up to the next level.

I saw the timer, which indicated 0:05, jump to 10:00. I took a deep breath, and when I was done, I heard a loud explosion, really close to me. I shook, fell on the ground to hide and heard explosions everywhere in the building. Some really softly, some slightly harder. Holy shit, the first explosion must have been on this floor, it was extremely loud. I was shaking when I tried to raise and realized there must have been at least twenty explosions all over the building. Bracelets from people who weren't clear enough to realize they had to get off their floor. Twenty kids. Dead.

I gripped my axe tightly while peeking around the corner. The preliminaries had begun. But when I saw the space I was in, the axe slipped out of my hands and I felt goose bumps coming up everywhere.

The big window opposite of me was splattered with blood and tiny pieces of human. The color red was overwhelming me and the stench of fresh blood was dwelling me. I had never smelled blood before but now I did it was very clear and disgusting.

When I woke up from my shock I asked myself if I dared to come closer. Yes, I did. I was Abbey Kingsleigh, not Jess Woods. I had promised myself I could do this.

I bit my cheeks while getting closer. The stench was unbearable. I noticed blood splatters everywhere. Damn, those bombs were powerful. Then I saw it, behind a desk.

There was a burn in the ground and the remains of a human being. My mouth dropped. I had never, ever seen anything like this. The people that had to go to the hospital because of me just had a scratch compared to this. I couldn't even recognize this as a human, let stand identify if it used to be a boy or a girl. The only part intact was a small part of the head and the under legs. I grabbed my axe from the floor, came closer once again and poked in one of the remains with it.

I felt vomit coming up. I turned around and tried to reach the main stairs. On my way I crossed a simple knife, probably from the person who just got blown up. I took it, put it under my belt and slowly opened the door to the stairs. I had to be careful. There were probably people on the move right now. Still, twenty less than before, so maybe only 140. How much time had passed since I heard the explosions? A minute?

While carefully observing the stairs, I heard another kind of explosion. This was a cannon, I recognized it from last year's Games. Someone had been killed, but not by their bracelet.

The only sound I heard after that came from way down, footsteps on the stairs too far away for me to worry about. Still I chose to go upstairs once again. I crept up the stairs, almost glued to the wall, more nervous than ever and still ill because of the unsanitary events I had just witnessed. God, I needed morphling. I was going mad.

I didn't see anyone on the next floor as well. The cannon went off again. I could feel the tension in the building. Somewhere, a door closed. I gripped the axe tightly and entered the office on this floor. It was light and looked peaceful, so I chose a chair in front of a desk and sat down. In front of me was a computer, which showed the picture of Artie Reilley from District 33. The latest victim. I sat there for a minute or so, the sun shone on my face, and just when I was about to think this wasn't that bad, I heard a noise on the stairs, rather close.

Shit! It made no sense, thinking this isn't that bad. There were still 140 tributes left somewhere on these 160 floors. I looked around, then dove under the desk I was sitting behind. There was a large gap in the wood, so I was visible if you were really looking for me.

The office door opened and I saw a large pair of boots enter. I couldn't see the face, the gap wouldn't allow me. My heart was beating in my ears when the boots and the belonging legs slowly walked around. They passed me on one meter distance and I didn't dare to breathe.

Then they continued their way. I realized I wasn't trapped – I could attack the person if I wanted. I could just do it. It would be good for the sponsors and good for my image. This was the time they would want me to attack. But I wasn't ready! Yes, I was, I had been telling myself that the last week. The large person was already going away! One down would be a good things, one less person to worry about!

I raised as fast as I could and suddenly everything went very quickly. The person, it turned out to be a dark-skinned giant, turned around as well and for the first time I saw his weapon - a big, curved sickle. There was no time to think, and before I knew it, the axe was planted in his chest. I had thrown it by instinct, it hit, it was a miracle. The boy seemed to be surprised at first, but when the blood started pouring down his chest, he looked up at me, disturbed. Then he fell to the ground and with a –bam- he was dead.

I just stood there, watching in silence. I had just killed somebody. Adrenaline was running through my veins while slowly my mind filled with facts and statements about the thing I just did. Murder. A crime that would cost you your life in District 1. Here it would earn you sponsors and therefore your life. I was a murderer. I killed someone. It was so sadistically easy.

I was seeing everything with a strange red color while approaching my victim and I pulled the axe out of his body. I tapped his face with my shoe, the one I picked out this morning. The head moved a bit. The cannon probably already went off, because the only computer screen I could see was showing his face. District 22.

I gripped the sickle out of his fingers. It was sharp, but was I able to use it? I think the axe would do better. I held the sickle in my hand, walked to the window, opened it (wow, the windows were open?), a cannon fired, and I threw the sickle out of the window. I turned around and wanted to go away, but when I heard a strange windy sound becoming louder I ducked automatically, and that was a good thing, because suddenly the sickle flew right over my head, back into the office, breaking a big vase before falling on a desk. Great, a force field around the building.

The vase made a loud noise and I realized I had to get off this floor. I stepped over the dead body and went back to the stairs. How many cannons had gone off since the start? Six? Seven? How long since the start? How long still to go?

Explosion from deep down in the building. I looked on my bracelet. Three minutes left on this floor.

**Long chapter! New one, idk, maybe in 1 or 2 weeks?**


	10. Chapter 10

There was one advantage of the skyscraper. There were computers everywhere, and although we weren't able to use them, they showed the faces of the deceased and the most important: the time. Right now it was exactly twelve o'clock, midday. Two hours had passed, still four to come. I was at one third.

I had

I heard countless cannons and explosions. A least fifty or sixty, so this building was getting emptier and emptier. I couldn't help wondering which tributes from District 1 were already dead. Was Kara alive? I hadn't really paid attention to the portraits on the computers.

I was on one of the lowest floors. The past two hours I had seen a few people but I hadn't attacked them and they didn't see me or didn't attack me as well. About half an hour ago I was on one of the floors were a bracelet had exploded and body parts had spread all over the room. Most of the floors were just offices and long corridors, but there had to be other spaces as well, like cafeterias. I hadn't found one yet.

I looked on my bracelet. Time on this floor was already running out and I had to move. I went down again. I gripped my axe while approaching the door of this floors' office and opened it. There was no one to see. Slowly I crept through the room. It had started raining and everything outside was grey and sad. On the floor were a few blood splatters. I kneeled, observed and saw they were not that old. Maybe a hurt person was staggering around this floor. The splatters were part of a track that led to a second door. I made as little sound as I could and tiptoed to that door. It was not locked. I didn't hear a sound, so I opened it and looked around the corner. Nothing to see.

I went in, looked over my shoulder, saw the computers displaying someone from District 5 and took a breath. The silence was deadly, but I smelled blood again. It was already familiar to me after two hours. The number of blood splatters increased and when I saw they didn't lead to the third door this floor but to the backside of a desk, I held my axe tight and stroked over my knife to make sure I still had it. Slowly I approached the desk. There was more and more blood on the floor. Finally I got there, collected some courage and looked over the desk.

My eyes narrowed by the sight. It was awful, maybe even worse than the bloody explosions everywhere (hey, a cannon went off), because you could recognize this person, well, as a person. I had passed corpses before in these two hours but they didn't seem to have died that atrocious, but behind the desk was laying a person who had been shot in the head with several arrows. The head was covered in blood and the longer I looked at the corpse, the more arrows I discovered. What the hell? There had to be a person with a bow around, and this person knew how to handle it. I turned my face away and wandered to the third door.

The next room was almost identical as the one before. I walked around again, but when I heard a soft noise my heart dropped and I dove behind a desk.

It didn't sound like bloodthirsty noises. It was sobbing. Someone was crying, not that loud but loud enough to be heard. What if it was a thirteen-year old? The sound came from the stairs. If I wanted to get off this floor, and I had to in a few minutes, I needed to pass this person. In other words, I had to fight this person. It was important for sponsors. However, I wasn't going to fight a crying thirteen-year old! Even I wasn't ready to do that.

Well, I didn't have a choice. I had to leave this floor.

I stood up and walked in the direction of the stairs and the crying. It became louder once I approached it and I knew it had to be right behind the entrance to the stairs.

Finally I had enough balls to open it. Damn, I was afraid of a crying person. I was in a building with –roughly- maybe ninety others who were all going to kill or be killed.

The person started speaking to me even before I saw her.

'Please don't kill me! Please don't!' she cried.

I turned around and finally saw her, sitting next to the stairs. She wasn't thirteen. She was at least my age, maybe older. I think she might even have been taller than me, but judging her figure, she came from East. Tears were running over her cheeks and dropping on her shirt. She didn't seem hurt, but she had a few blood spots on her clothes. She was blonde, something you didn't see often in East. When she saw my axe, with the dried blood of my only victim on it, her eyes widened.

'Mercy! Please!'

'Wow, relax' I said. Why was she, a tall, big girl, so afraid, so terrified? Based on first looks, she didn't have to be. She didn't look as unhealthy as some others from East, so she had to have some strength in her muscles.

'What's going on? Are you hurt?' I asked, doubting on what to do. Even though she wasn't thirteen, it still didn't feel like a good idea to kill her somehow.

She didn't answer my question but remained terrified of me and began crying even louder.

'Hey, can I do something?' I knew it was risky to offer someone I just met help, but it seemed unethical not to. We had to help each other; we weren't participating right now out of free will. And maybe Mrs. Johnson would see my heart-warming actions.

She stared at me with big, watery eyes. 'You are nicer than all the others'

'Were there others? How many have passed?'

She said I was nice. Wow.

'I don't know, I've been so afraid all the time, I can't remember. You aren't going to kill me, right? Right?' She asked.

'Er' I began 'of course not'

That seemed to comfort her and for the first time she smiled. 'Thank you so much. I'm so scared, I want to go home!'

'Me too' I said 'I think everyone will.'

She was trembling from top to toe and still didn't seem to relax completely. Was I that terrifying?

'I hope my sisters are all right' she whispered, and she started sobbing again.

'Are your sisters starving at home?' I asked, knowing it might hit a sensitive spot.

'No!' she wept 'They came here with me. Both of them!'

I had to stop myself from letting out a scream of horror. I didn't have any brothers or sisters, but I could imagine how horrible it would be to be in the games with them. It might even be worse than with your best friend.

'Oh my God' I said 'I feel sorry for you'

'Thank you, I needed a nice word before I die' she mumbled.

'Maybe you aren't going to die' I said, and hesitated for a while but then I decided to sit down next to her. She didn't move.

'Oh, I don't think I'll die' she said 'I want to win'

I felt like laughing, because she was maybe even weaker than Jess. But then I saw the space we were in from another perspective. I hadn't looked at the floor since coming here because I had to talk to this girl. But now I did, I felt shivers coming up.

'Why…the hell' I began slowly 'Is there so much blood on the floor here?'

'ALEXANDRIA! NOW!' the girl suddenly screamed, very loudly, and I shook.

Everything went very fast from that moment on. Suddenly an arrow flew by right next to my ear, and another only missed my upper leg by a centimeter. I jumped up, gripped my axe and ran to hide for the arrows under the stairs, where I heard someone running on.

'What the fuck!' I screamed. The girl smiled at me, stood up and suddenly I saw a second person. My heart was beating in my chest and I couldn't move.

This person immediately frightened me. She was at least as tall as the crying girl who wasn't crying anymore, and she was older. She was so skinny she resembled a skeleton. I could see the bones sticking out while she was holding a bow in her hands. The bow!

Holy shit. They had driven me in a corner. The skinny girl, Alexandria, pointed her bow at me. The other girl was standing in the corner, laughing. And I don't know why, but the only thing I could think of that this had to be one of her sisters. The same hair color, the same eyes. They had trapped me. Looking at all the blood on the floor, they had trapped some others as well and they had all died in here. What kind of twisted tactic was this?

'Get ready to say goodbye, stupid, naïve whore' said the girl with the bow. She was pointing at my heart. I had to do something? But before I knew what, she had already shot. I jumped in a random direction and I felt the arrow penetrating my flesh, but luckily not my heart. It was my waist. I looked down quickly and saw the arrow sticking out of my hip. It had gone really deep. The pain was unbearable, but the only chance I had of escaping was this moment, the moment Alexandria needed to get another arrow. While I was holding the arrow in my hip in place I took my knife, inhaled and ran past her, making a cut in her arm. She dropped her arrow to cry in pain and while passing the other girl (how could I be so stupid to trust her? How?) I tried to stab her to but she easily avoided the blade. I ran up the stairs and kept running. I heard them chasing me, so I sprinted even harder, saw a random door after going up ten floors or so, opened and closed it silently and hid behind the first desk I saw.

I heard Alexandria and her sister running up the stairs trying to find me and when they passed my floor my heart stopped for a minute. I had never been so scared before, but they ran past. I heard Alexandria calling her sibling Hayden, if I had heard it well. Jesus Christ, Hayden was one hell of an actress. But I wasn't afraid of her. In my head I kept replaying the first moment I saw Alexandria and it frightened me every single time. The hollow eyes, the skeleton-like features and the sharp bow. They must have hidden the bodies of the previous victims of their trap. And there was a third sister according to Hayden! I bit my lip and my mouth was dry.

I started crying. I was in pain, I had an arrow in my waist, but I knew pulling it out would not be a good thing to do. I knew this wound wasn't fatal. But it was going to hold me back.

Death had never been so close before. I was shaking from top to toe. Afraid, lonely and weak and hurt. I heard an explosion from above me. My bracelet indicated five minutes left.

I had to get to the other stairs. I didn't dare to use the other stairs anymore. I had to remain hidden for the rest of the preliminaries. That was the only way to survive. I got up, felt a stinging pain from my waist and made it to the other stairs without falling.

I was so angry at myself for being lured like that into a trap. I wanted revenge, but not right now. On the stairs I passed the corpse of a young boy. I felt myself mentally become weaker by the second.

And like that, another hour passed. The living in the building were decreasing, the death increasing. Less and less competition, less and less moving enemies in the building. Most of the time I hid behind desks until time on the floor was running out. I had to use the bathroom, but all the toilets were locked. I was hungry, as well. There were bottles of water everywhere in the offices, but I didn't dare to drink anything because I had to pee.

It was likely at least someone from our District would be dead already. Who would it be? I could only hope it was one person, and the name didn't start with a K or R or F.

**Haha, I've uploaded new chapter within 2 days! I've never been more proud of myself & I'll try to continue this habit :D**


	11. Chapter 11

When it was half past three, I was exhausted. I was thirsty, had to use the bathroom, I was wounded and uncomfortable. However, I was still alive. I was keeping the promise I made myself to win. I was still on the right track.

I had used the past hour to over think the things I had seen so far. I was a murderer, but strangely enough I didn't care that much about the kill. I had to look forward to the future now and realizing what I had done would come later. The future. The preliminaries would end in half an hour and there was only a quarter of the original contestants left, so encountering one was rare.

My waist was covered in blood and I had used some tissues I had found on a desk to clean it, but it kept bleeding. I had broken the arrow in two so the point was still in there but the tail not. Doctors in the Head City would take it out once we were freed from this building.

I wanted to cry. Even someone like me, who had been hardened on the streets for so many years, couldn't take the horrors I had seen. How was I going to live on like this?

The thought of morphling made me feel ecstatic.

I looked on my bracelet. Since there was only half an hour left, I only had to move three times more to remain safe. Walking up the stairs was extraordinary painful.

The silence was deadly. I hadn't heard a cannon in maybe twenty minutes. Most of the tributes were probably hiding. Only the most bloodthirsty ones were still moving around. Luckily I didn't see one. If I hadn't had that arrow in my waist, I would have been on the move. I couldn't allow myself to look weak on camera but I had no choice.

I stood up because I had to move to another floor. Carefully holding on to furniture I made my way to a lower floor which seemed to be abandoned. This was not an office, it was a restaurant. The food was all gone, but under a table was a good place to hide.

While I was sitting there, invisible to others, I saw another tribute for the first time in a long while. It was a guy, he was running really fast and he was gone within half a minute.

What if I was the only survivor of our group? I would be so lonely the following week.

Time was ticking and before I knew it the ten minutes on this floor were almost over. I went another floor down and knew that in a quarter I would be safe from all the killing. It felt horrible, not being able to defend myself because I was hurt. I avoided the stairs where I had encountered the sisters and hid again.

And nothing happened during the very last quarter of the preliminaries. At 3:59 PM I was sitting on a chair and staring at a computer monitor that showed the time. When it jumped to 4:00 PM, I noticed that my bracelet timer stopped working. I inhaled and exhaled.

Oh my God. Preliminaries were over. They were over. I had survived.

'Good afternoon, everyone!' said an enthusiastic voice. It was the president. 'I cannot express how proud I am. The nation salutes you. If you are hearing this, you belong to the bravest of all tributes. I can report to you that you have outlived 132 of your fellow tributes, and that you are now in the running to become the second victor of the games, together with 28 others!'

I was trembling from top to toe. The feeling was indescribable. Yes, I was proud, but so many things were going through my head right now. I had to have fresh air, I think. I stood up and opened a window. The sea breeze flew in.

'Please make your way out. Put your weapons down. Any kill or attempt to will be severely punished. Get to the ground floor, which is accessible from now on. You will meet your mentor there.'

Luckily I wasn't on a high floor. The eight floors I had to go down to get to the ground floor were a torture, but I wasn't the only injured. I met others on the stairs. One of them had a deep, long cut in his forehead, causing his head and glasses to be soaked in red.

I could hear noises becoming louder once I approached the ground. I was about to find out who had survived. I heard laughter, conversations, cries of joy and cries of sadness.

The survivors had all lost at least a couple of friends.

I stumbled into the hall. It was crowded, a strange thing after these six hours of loneliness. I looked around if I saw someone familiar, but the only thing I saw was dirty blonde Hayden on the other side of the room. She was talking to a man who was probably her mentor. I had to stop myself from running towards her and ripping her eyes out. I would probably die on the way because of the wound her sister gave me. But when I saw that sister arriving, all I felt was fear and I hid behind some people. They hadn't seen me, though. They were way too busy with being praised for their good performances. With them was also a third girl, a redhead, who might have been the second sister or just another friend they brought here.

While I was trying to find someone I knew, I looked at the other tributes. Most of them were older, at least sixteen, but there were also a few younger ones. Some of them were forgettable, some of them not. A boy with a cap on (thanks to it I couldn't see his face well) was leaning against the wall and his hands were covered in blood. Seeing everything I guessed there were slightly more males than females.

'Abbey!' I heard someone calling me. The voice was too familiar and I almost wanted to jump to the sound. But before I could move I was getting hugged so tightly I couldn't breathe and the arrow was pushed deeper in my flesh.

'Er – you are hurting me' I stumbled, and Kara let go. I looked her in the eyes. She seemed unharmed. Then she embraced me again, less tightly this time.

'I'm so glad you made it! I'm just so glad!' she cried. I was indescribably happy too. I had someone with me. There was someone for me. I wasn't going to be alone. We were in this together.

'Wait. What about the others?' I asked.

'Rose is dead. I saw her portrait on those computers, maybe around half past twelve? And I don't know about the others.'

It felt like I had a rock in my stomach. I knew there were going to be deaths in our group, but it was still hard. Rose wasn't here anymore.

'I don't think the other two are still to come' Kara continued 'but we got each other'

'Yes' I said, and we sat down.

'Jeez, that thing is not pretty' she said, while pointing at the arrow 'why didn't you pull it out? Here, let me help you-' she reached out for it, but I smashed her hand away.

'No, don't. I read somewhere it's better if you don't pull it out.' I said.

'Oh, ok'

'How many kills did you make?' I asked.

'Two' she said without blushing 'I don't want to talk about it'

'There you are!' We saw Laika coming towards us. We stood up and he embraced us as well. He pressed us close to him and said it took a while before he had convinced the guards our mentor wasn't well, so the escort had to be there to pick up District 1.

'You two made it. District 1 has two tributes. Extraordinary. Well done, girls.'

'So there are no others?' I asked.

'No' Laika said with a guilty face 'Flora was already dead within ten minutes, she wasn't fast enough after waking up, she didn't make it to another floor on time. Jess wasn't trying to hide or anything when she encountered someone on the 67th floor and she wasn't even trying to win the fight that followed. And Rose was driven in a corner by someone from East, luckily she was dead after just one stab. And both killers, Jess' and Roses, are dead, so you don't have to get revenge or something.'

'So it's really just us' Kara whispered.

'Yes. It's over for now. We need to get you back to the apartment and you, Abbey, you need to go to the medics in an instant. They'll take you home.'

We had to stay there for a while, until the president appeared with the head Gamemaker who had whispered in my ear at the train station. Were they going to continue the investigation on Jess' injuries, although she was dead? I hoped not.

'Tributes, mentors, well done everyone. I'm honored to announce the location of this year's first arena. It will be…District 6!'

I saw many people frowning. My topographic knowledge wasn't that good, I roughly knew where District 6 was, I believe it was below District 2, in the very south of the continent, but I had no idea what its previous name was.

'What can we expect?' I asked Laika.

'Hard to say, but I guess heat. It's a very warm climate there'`

I bit my lip. I wasn't good with heat, but I also disliked cold. However, these were the New Games, and I could have known this was coming.

* * *

The idea of Rose, Flora and Jess being dead was weird and it still hadn't got through. I hoped it wouldn't until after the Games. There would be more losses. The only one that was going to be important was Kara, but maybe we were going to meet some other nice people. Oh wait, I wasn't going to trust anyone anymore. Not after what happened at the preliminaries at the staircase. That was all I could think about while laying on a bed at a medical clinic.

There were roughly twelve others here, all survivors but all injured. On the bed next to me laid the boy with the cut in his forehead. It needed stitches.

After leaving the 'tower of terror', Laika took Kara home and sent me to some sort of highly advanced technological clinic. Those doctors had given me a weird pill and somehow I couldn't feel my whole waist after that. It was such a strange feeling and I couldn't look while they were taking out the arrow and healing the wound. Blood from others was fine, but not mine.

When I got home, it was around four PM. The television was turned on and broadcasting stuff from earlier today. I was indescribably happy to be alive and breathing. Seeing that stuff gave me goose bumps. I didn't want to look at it, so I went upstairs to take a very hot shower.

The water was really hot. I was hopping on one foot while I tried to change the temperature. Finally I gave up and got out of the shower cabin. I didn't dare to sleep because I was afraid of nightmares about skeleton-like creatures shooting arrows and big guys with axes in their backs. I sat down in front of the window and stared at the view. The city was partying.

When we were called for dinner, I was happy I was able to at least do something. Now there was only three of us at the dinner table. The food was extra nice this evening. They'd better done that last evening, when there were still six people.

'Well, to you and to the following week' said Laika and he raised his glass. I hated toasting and refused to, but Kara did. Laika ignored my rudeness and put his fork down.

'Right, I might as well explain the programme for this week. Tonight they'll announce the preliminaries' winners. Chariot Rides are tomorrow, we will go there early because your stylists demanded that. After tomorrow evening, the gambling stations will open, so it's important to behave well. Then there's a few days of training, but I can't help you there. I'm afraid you'll have to hope that Charlotte will be able to give you some advice, but I wouldn't count on it, so in training, it will be just you. On the last day they will decide your training score and then interviews will be held. Questions?'

I shook my head. Kara didn't say anything.

'Good. Finish your meal, then we'll watch the special broadcast on the victors of the preliminaries.'

Halfway through dinner Charlotte joined us. 'Well done' she said, almost incomprehensibly 'I knew it would be you two'

'How would you know? You are never sober' I answered.

'Do you think that affects my sight?' she threatened.

Yes, I thought, but I didn't say it out loud.

* * *

Ceasar Flickerman was again one year older, but it was invisible. I had no idea how old he was in reality. He'd been a celebrity for so long, here and in Panem, so he couldn't be younger than at least seventy-five. However, he was still an energetic man.

'And welcome back to the New Games, where the whole world has been looking forward to for eleven months! Hello everyone here and at home!'

Now that three people were gone, we all fitted on the same couch.

'There's no doubt about the fact that you all know what took place earlier today: our nerve-wrecking preliminaries. This year they were just as epic as last year, with an innovative arena and more. This year we have 28 contestants competing in District 6, 15 males and 13 females. With me in the studio I have head Gamemaker Pillano, who returns as Head Gamemaker this year. Give him a warm applause!'

I didn't understand how the people in the studio were able to clap for that skinny, pale man sitting there on the stage, arrogantly frowning.

'So, Franq, you know there's a huge weight resting on your shoulders after the first games, people are wondering how you will make Games that are even more fantastic this year. Let us start with the preliminaries. Of course we have winners, a boy and a girl with the highest score. I remember last year, our wonderful couple Mason and Poppy, God, I miss them; did these winners deserve it?' asked Ceasar.

'Yes, undoubtedly' said the Head Gamemaker.

'If I'm not mistaken, each kill is awarded one or more points – one point for an average kill, two points for a good kill and three points for an excellent kill.' Ceasar remarked.

'And fifteen if you finish someone from your own District.' Added Pillano.

'Yes, yes. Well, the winners. Were there good results for them?'

I poked Kara. 'I think I know the female winner.' It could be no one else than bony Alexandria. Considering the blood on the floor and the guy shot with all the arrows behind the desk…

'Yes, excellent scores.' Said Pillano.

'Very good. Ok, for everyone who doesn't know, the winners get five minutes extra interview time, a crown during the chariot rides and something that will protect them during the first three days of the Games. Well, don't let us wait anymore. Who is the male victor?'

'He amazed everyone, and impressed us hugely. It is Fabio Cornelli from District 31.'

The Head Gamemaker said it in such a way as if he were extremely bored, but the crowd in the studio applauded and cheered. I saw Laika writing down Fabio's name.

'He had an astounding twenty-eight points.'

'Oh my God' said Ceasar, but it was impossible to catch it. If you listened closely, you could hear the City outside make noise and scream Fabio's name. The people in the studio seemed to go crazy with joy.

Twenty-eight points. How the hell could I ever think I had a chance? This guy had twenty-eight points! How many kills were that? Last year's male victor only had, what was it, nineteen?

Fabio's picture appeared on the television. He didn't look like a ruthless killer. Just an ordinary, healthy, dark haired seventeen year old from West.

'We are pleased to announce that Fabio is the first one in these Games yet to obtain the fifteen points rewarded for eliminating one of your own District partners. His total of twenty-eight was built up from a fifteen-point kill, one three-point kill, three two-point kills and six one-point kills.'

'This guy is someone to look out for' said Laika, scribbling even more stuff on his paper.

'Fantastic' said Ceasar 'Mason can learn something from that. And the female?'

'There was some more competition here but the winner still deserved to win. It is Alexandria from District 18.'

Applause. Cheers. Hurray. When her portrait came on screen, I was ashamed when I felt my heartbeat speeding up. God, why was I so afraid of her? I didn't want to, but I knew I had plenty of reasons to. Especially after hearing about tributes with dazzling scores competing in the Games.

'She had a total of seventeen points, just like last year's female victor. Five times three points and one time two points. All thanks to the smart tactic she participated in.'

'But you escaped, Abbey' Laika smiled at me 'the Head City likes you for that'


	12. Chapter 12

When I realized I would never be able to sleep, I crept to Charlottes room and within ten minutes I was dozing off on the floor of my bedroom because the morphling caused me to forget everything. God, it was so easy to steal from my mentor. I felt bad, and I almost never felt bad for anyone, but since I was here, somehow I was able to.

However, it calmed me down and the feeling of total relaxation was a blessing. I managed to drag myself to my bed to fall asleep and when the next morning came, my head was clear and empty. I was ready to kick some ass, whatever we were going to do.

Thanks to the dose of morphling I forgot most of the things I did last night, but I did remember crying over Rose and Flora.

I went downstairs. Laika was waiting for me.

'Hey, you need to get dressed. We're late.' He said.

'For what?' I asked.

'You know. Look, I know you were using morphling last night, okay. Don't play dumb. But we need to go to the Avenue of Victory. Chariot Rides are this evening and your stylist demands every single minute today. I'm usually not the person to rush but now we really need to. Please hurry up.'

'Why do we need to be so strictly on time? That stylist can wait.' I complained.

'No' Laika smiled 'I promise you, after today you know that you do need to be right on time.'

'But I haven't had breakfast yet and I'm hungry' I said.

'They'll get you something' he said.

I went upstairs, unsatisfied, to change my pajamas for other clothes. Kara was ready at the same time.

'Lovely. Now, Charlotte will join us later, we just need to get in the car. Hopefully there's not that much traffic' Laika said, and pushed us into the elevator. Now that a huge part of the building was empty, and mentors with no tributes were staying somewhere else, it was really steady in the hall. Jesus, Chariot Rides. This could be fun. The whole dressing-up wasn't really my thing and I didn't get what it had to do with the Games, but okay, it was a tradition.

While driving through the Head City we were able to see the building that we were going all the time. It was by far the biggest one in the city, long, high and massive. I believe they had one like this in the Capitol as well, but I never saw it on television since I never watched the Hunger Games.

'I heard District 4 had no survivors at all' said Laika, who was sitting next to the driver 'so they won't win again this year'

'Which Districts still have a lot of tributes left then?' Kara asked.

'I believe, if I'm not mistaken, that 18 and 24 both have three tributes out of five left. Eighteen is the District of Alexandria, the female preliminaries winner, you know. She survived together with her two sisters, I don't know their names though.'

'One of them is called Hayden' I said, while staring out of the window.

'Right, and 24 has three guys, but they were not astounding in the preliminaries, at least I didn't remember them.'

After a few minutes we entered a tunnel which led to the catacombs of the Avenue of Victory. The driver parked the car in a garage and we went up by elevator. I was feeling a little nervous. Tonight, again so many people would see me. I certainly wasn't shy, but this was so weird and unreal.

'Hello' said Laika to the man waiting at a door 'District 1'

'Fisher and Kingsleigh?' asked the man, while reading it off from a list.

'Yes.'

'Please continue.' He said, and he put a tick on his list.

We went through the door and suddenly we were in a huge corridor with a wall of windows on one side. The sun was streaming in. We were probably on one of the highest floors of the 'backstage' area of the Avenue of Victory, because the view was amazing.

'I'm going to leave you here, but I'll check up on you later. Someone will pick you up in a minute.' Laika announced.

'Ok' I said, and Kara nodded. Then he left.

There we were, the two of us, alone in the massive corridor. It was pretty warm. 'Amazing, isn't it?' Kara remarked while she walked to the window and pressed her hands against the glass.

'Well, thanks to that Rose and Flora aren't here anymore.' I said.

'And Jess' Kara added.

'Oh, boohoo. Who cares about her?' I said.

'Come on, get over it. She's gone. Why don't you stop the hating and focus on your own life?' she asked.

'Hello' a third person said. We turned around. It was a middle-aged woman.

'District 1?' asked she. We nodded. 'Right, follow me.'

She walked to the other side of the corridor in a hasty pass. We almost had to run to keep up. My stomach was rumbling. I needed breakfast.

'You're lucky, District 1. One of the most respected stylists the City has has been assigned to your District last year and this year he's representing this role.' The woman said. She led us to a darker space that we crossed and then we entered another corridor.

'Here it is' said our caretaker, while stopping at a door 'at least, for one of you. Who's Kara?'

'I am' Kara said and the door was opened for her. I couldn't see what was behind it.

'Good luck' I said, and she smiled. Then she went in.

'It looks like you are the one who got the best stylist in the whole nation' the woman remarked while we continued our journey. How far did this woman want me to walk?

Eventually we stopped in front of a big door.

'Good luck' she said, and opened the door for me. I didn't say anything and went in. Then the door closed behind me. I looked up.

The dressing room was huge and dark. There were several people with uniforms, who stood silently in a corner. In front of me was standing a man. He was only a few centimeters taller than me, but it was impossible to guess his age. He looked fairly normal in comparison to other people I'd seen here. He was wearing a black tunic and he had a tiny, trimmed black beard. He didn't smile. So this was the most respected stylist in the City? Didn't impress me.

I didn't get why he was frowning at me, so I wanted to step forward and introduce myself, but when I moved he raised his hand to make me stop. Instinctively I stopped. Causing trouble with the stylist I had to spend the next week with wasn't a good idea.

However, after a minute of complete silence it became scary. My stylist had walked around me, had pulled my hair and had lifted my face. Every second his frown became deeper.

Finally he said something.

'This is even worse than I thought'

'Excuse me?' I defended myself.

My stylist looked up, narrowed his eyes and gave a sign to the servants in the corner. They approached me and started unbuttoning my clothes. I tried to protest, but they didn't stop.

While they were doing that, the guy in black was walking around me again.

'The following week you'll be in my hands, Prul Peridot, and you'd do better to shut up every second of this week so I can concentrate on making you look somewhat presentable. I have a very strict schedule and I'm glad I already ordered your sizes a few days ago because otherwise I'd have to improvise on my precious designs.'

When I was just in my underwear, he examined me again.

'I'm hungry' I said. He lifted one eyebrow up. 'Well, you'd better skip breakfast more often, because you need to look thinner.'

'I am ninety pounds and 5, 7'' I said coldly.

'Too much' Prul said, and he tossed me a bathrobe. Then he pushed me onto a weird bedlike chair.

'Why can't people in District 1 take care of themselves properly?' he complained, while pushing a button so the chair suddenly became flat and I was laying instead of sitting.

'What are you going to do?' I asked. 'Waxing, of course' he replied 'Do you think I will present a hairy person tonight? No.'

I was horrified when the slaves of my stylist started putting weird strips on my legs and when they pulled them off I screamed. What the heck? What were those things? They were putting even more on my arms. 'Stop it!' I shouted 'It hurts!'

Prul, who had been sitting on another chair, slowly stood up and the other people stepped aside while he approached. He didn't say anything and suddenly slapped me in the face. 'Don't be such a pain in the ass,' he whispered 'if you whine like this in the Games you'll get a knife in your back instead of a hand on your face.'

'I hate you already' I said with a straight face, and laid down. The stylist stroked his beard, then turned around and sat down. I bit my cheeks while they got rid of the rest of my hair. I had never been this hairless before. And when they put some sort of crème on my legs they had never been this smooth before. They made me put on my bathrobe again and pushed me on another chair.

'Tonight you'll have to shine' Prul said, while pulling my hair. It hurt, because he pulled too hard. When he saw my hurt face, he only said: 'Don't worry about it.' Then he cut my hair off.

At first I was too petrified to react, but then I jumped up. 'What did you do? Why did you do that?'

'I don't need permission. You're mine.' He said.

This man had natural authority. I didn't know exactly what it was, but attacking didn't seem a good idea. I hated him. I hated everything.

However, I hated to admit it, but he was right. He was a magician with a pair scissors. A few minutes later my hair looked better than before. Previously it was long and not taken care of, but now it was just above shoulder length and clean. My heartbeat became calmer and I became even hungrier. The morning flew away and lunch was brought for everyone, but Prul didn't allow me to eat anything. 'Good training for the Games' he said. I was disgusted.

After a couple of hours they were done with my hair and it turned out they were really going to need the whole day. I bit my lip when I realized I was on the very first Chariot this year, because I was from District 1. We were opening the show. In a few hours, holy shit.

They were putting all sorts of weird stuff on my face, but for the first time in my life I felt clean and pretty. The endless sitting in a chair annoyed me and every minute I hated Prul more, and he probably hated me.

But when the sky was getting darker and it was around seven PM, dinner came.

'Here' said my stylist, while passing me a bowl of lettuce 'you can have this'

'I don't like lettuce' I said, but I still ate it, because I was starving.

Finally, they revealed my costume. At first I didn't quite understand what it was. Our District's specialization was Modern Communication, but I had no idea what this costume was about. It looked like some sort of collection of wires.

'You don't have to know what it is, because everyone will know I have designed it so they will love it' Prul announced, while he began putting it on. The costume was indeed made out of wires, just wires and nothing else. He wrapped them around my chest so tightly I almost couldn't breathe and my upper legs couldn't move while he put the thread around me. This was the most uncomfortable thing ever, but when I first saw the whole in the mirror, it actually looked fine. The golden and silver wires braided themselves around my body.

'Well, I guess this'll have to do.' My stylist said. Then he grabbed my arm and dragged me out of the room. The thread was cutting in my flesh while we got in the elevator to go down, where the preparation hall was. I didn't say anything while we the elevator was moving. I was afraid of my stylist. I was never afraid of someone, they were always afraid of me. But now, a lot of people frightened me. Thinking about the preliminaries…

'Hey' Kara said. She was wearing the same as I was wearing, the strange costume. Apparently I was one of the last to arrive, because the space where we were in was crowded. Chariots with each a pair of horses in front of them were waiting in a row, ready to ride on the Avenue, which was behind two enormous doors. I could already hear the mass outside, screaming and partying. Two hundred thousand people. And everyone was watching, at home, in Panem, in the far east of the continent and maybe even in New Asia.

I didn't say anything to my stylist anymore and walked away. I didn't know if I was allowed to, but I still did. 'He's a dictator' I said to Kara while we were walking to the very first chariot of the line.

'Well, your hairdo is nice' she said. We climbed on the vehicle and waited. There was a countdown above the doors. Five minutes before they would open. The ambiance in the space was excited and thrilled.

'Good luck' said Laika, who appeared out of nowhere 'I will be watching with Charlotte and your stylists on some of the best spots on the galleries. Nice costumes'

'They are not that comfortable, actually' said Kara.

'Well, you both look really good' he answered. Then he turned around and left us.

The butterflies in my stomach were only flattering faster and faster while the final preparations were made. Tributes were getting on their chariots and waited. The second chariot, the one behind us, was apparently for District 5, meaning no one from 2, 3 or 4 survived. A single, brown-haired guy was standing on it.

'I hope it won't be that cold' Kara said, trying to make herself hearable over the noise coming from outside and this room.

'Nope. Always summer here' I said.

'Well, this is it. Smile, right?' she asked.

'Yeah.' I answered. We both didn't want to have a conversation, we were too tense.

And finally, after the five minutes were almost over, the doors were slowly opening and the music had begun.

**New chapter in either a few days ****or**** a week or two, because I might not be able to upload again before going to London for a week.**


	13. Chapter 13

The noise everyone made was overwhelming.

The horses started walking and pulled the chariot onto the huge lane. There was nobody in front of us, so we had an excellent view. Lights were blinding my face while we rode the first twenty meters. They hadn't told us anything on how to behave. I wanted to smile, but it was hard, and I didn't dare to move my body because I was afraid my costume would fall apart. But seeing my serious and worried face on huge screens, I changed my mind and tried to curl my lips into a smile.

The music was bombastic and hurting my ears. This was such bullshit. This had nothing to do with competing in the Games. It was all for the entertainment of people dumb enough to accept this all. And I didn't want to smile anymore. Maybe it was an idea to remain serious the whole time. I had to look cool. Yes, that was it.

Kara was having other thoughts, but I didn't try to talk to her. It was impossible because of the noise, the wind and the movements from the Chariot.

A flower almost hit my face. I fetched it from the air and threw it carelessly over my shoulder. I felt a slight indignation from the public, but I didn't care.

Eventually we approached the end of the Avenue, which consisted out of a huge stone stairs with a platform on top of it, where the president was sitting with last year's victor at his right hand. Our chariot made a curve to right, which caused me to hold on tightly to it. Eventually we stopped and I looked over my shoulder. District 5 went left, and the one behind it right and so on. After a few minutes every single one was positioned in the semicircle in front of the huge stairs. The company on the platform had grown; the two preliminaries' victors where standing next to the president. Alexandria looked horrible in her costume, which was some sort of tight-fitting leather cat suit. District 18, livestock. If you looked from a distance she looked like the branch of a tree or a wooden stick. Fabio, on the contrary, looked ordinary. He wore a fancy suit but that was it. He looked shy and not impressed by the two-hundred thousand people screaming his name. I wondered why he won. Him being so mysterious made him even more dangerous than Alexandria, because it was a fact he killed the most people of all, even one of his District partners. No one knew what to expect, except the Gamemakers. And they were loving our ignorance.

The president ordered silence and immediately everything became rather quiet.

'I am very pleased and honored to welcome you, tributes, citizens and others, to the second annual New Games,' preached the president 'we are all very impressed by your performances so far'

God, this was stupid. How could they possibly _enjoy _this?

'You all look lovely, you deserve to be here. President Snow the second from Panem has asked me to salute you all and wish you the best in your journey to glory, wealth and fame.'

'Don't you think this is annoying as hell?' I said to Kara 'Don't you just want to jump off this thing and slay everyone who listens to this shit?'

'Quiet' said Kara. My mouth dropped. My counterpart didn't agree?

The president was shaking Fabio's hand and then Alexandria's. Soon after that, the Chariots were already going back.

We were the first to ride onto the lane-and we were last to leave it again. When the doors shut behind us and the crowd noises faded away, I was able to breathe again. I wanted to rip off the costume and just go back to the apartment.

'Good job, Kara!' said Laika, who was walking to our chariot while we were getting off. 'You looked really appealing to the public. Abbey, do you have some kind of tactic? Why didn't you smile?'

'Do I need to?' I asked indifferently.

'No, but it attracts people' He argued.

'Well, that isn't me. If they want to love me they'll have to love the person I am now.' I said.

'They won't. This is the Head City.' Laika said.

'I don't care. I just want this off, sorry' I said, while trying to pull some of the wires of my costume.

'Let's go home. I hope Charlotte is alright, I left her there.'

* * *

I tore the costume apart as soon as we got home and left the pieces on the ground. I hoped Prul would find it. Ha, that would freak him out. Tomorrow was the first day of training. We were free to go, whenever we wanted. It wasn't even a problem if we didn't come at all. The training center was in the basement of the building where we were staying. I didn't want to rewatch the Chariot Rides and went to bed. I wanted to train. I was motivated.

I had decided to train myself on edible plants and things like that. Combat would come later, maybe the second or third day of training. All I knew was that the arena would be in District 6, which, I had discovered, used to be 'Spain', and that I could expect heat and exotic plants.

And when I woke up, the sun was shining as always. It felt like the preliminaries were a long time ago and strangely enough I was completely used to the fact that there were only two of us left. I got out of bed, stretched my legs and hoped Kara would be already at breakfast so that we could talk about our training possibilities.

I knew Charlotte, who, on the contrary of Laika, had access to the Training Center, wouldn't help us. Last night she was in some sort of coma. We had to train ourselves.

The living room was empty, apart from servants. They served me breakfast when I sat down. I was hungry and attacked my food. I had gained weight since I got here. I ate even more than I normally did, just to annoy Prul. Maybe he'd hit me again if he noticed, but then I would hit him back.

'Morning' said Kara, while entering the room. She was wearing the same training suit as me. 'Hi. So, what will we do about training?' I said.

'Whoa, not so fast. I need to wake up already.' She moaned, and planted her elbows on the table. 'I'm sorry. I just don't know. How do we know what to do without Charlotte?'

'Maybe Laika?' I suggested.

'No, he's never been to the Training Center and was instructed not to interfere with tribute training because he's an escort' said Kara. 'He told me last night.'

There was no schedule for tribute training. You were allowed to train whenever you wanted. After breakfast we went down with the elevator to the basement.

The training Center was huge. It was a massive gym with all sorts of materials to practice endurance, strength, weaponry and natural things, like fire-making. I thought we were pretty early, but there were at least twenty other people in this hall.

'Well, where do you want to start?' I asked. There was no doubt we would be training together.

'The fire-making will do' she said, and we looked around to find the station. Strangely enough there was no teacher there.

'It's like they don't _want_ us to train' Kara complained 'no mentor, no teacher!'

I nodded furiously. We sat down. 'I have no idea what we must do' I said while looking at the pile of branches, leaves and stones, and reached for two wooden sticks. While rubbing them against each other (maybe that would heat them?) I couldn't help staring at some other tributes. I saw Hayden at the knife-throwing station and I felt myself becoming really angry at her. I was still ashamed because she managed to trick me and let her freaky sis shoot me. Although I wanted to attack her, I was scared too.

I also saw Fabio, but he wasn't doing anything significant. 'How can you make a fire out of sticks and stones?' Kara remarked 'we should have watched the Hunger Games more often, then we would have known how to.'

'Maybe we can help' someone said. I looked over my shoulder and saw two boys.

One of them was very tall and slender, covered in pimples and had ginger hair. His glasses made his eyes bigger than they probably were. The other, however, was his complete opposite; chubby, short, pink-faced and black-haired. They looked like they were the most comfortable on the couch with a bag of potato chips, not in a training center.

'What?' I said.

The chubby boy spoke. 'We couldn't help noticing that you two were having some trouble making a fire. We, well, at least he-' he pointed at the ginger '-knows very well how to light one.'

I looked at Kara and she at me.

'Why would you help us? Why should we trust you?' I asked.

'Can we sit down?' said fatty. We nodded. They did. The boy started whispering. 'Our friend was shot with many arrows, shot by that witch from eighteen. We barely escaped, we hid behind a desk. We saw you when you came in, you discovered him and then you were also lured into their trap. But you escaped.' He said to me.

'So? Why would that help us trust you?' Kara said.

'Why would you want to trust us? We are just offering you help because clearly you cannot make a fire on your own. Timothy here is excellent with nature.'

The ginger smiled nervously. 'I've had a lot of practice. You then, Mika, you know all sorts of traps.'

'Where are you from?' I asked. They were obviously from West.

'35. Just above 5, and under 7.' The chubby, who apparently was called Mika, said. 'Don't you have a mentor?'

'Yes, we do. She's just not here. She's a Morphling addict.' I said. My mind was blank. I hadn't had the drug in a couple of days now and it felt like crap.

'My aunt was one too' the silent boy said, Timothy 'She died two years ago.'

'Look, are you going to show us how to light a fire or not?' I interrupted. Timothy looked up, blinked a few times with his weirdly big eyes and then got a branch and a stone. Less than a minute later we had a fire. I wasn't really the person to be impressed with something, but I couldn't resist complimenting him. 'Where did you learn this stuff?'

'There's a lot of space to do so in 35. A couple of small cities, but the rest of it is just grazing land, hills and forests. I used to live in the forest.' He answered shyly.

'How old are you two?' Kara asked.

'I'm sixteen, he is fourteen' Mika responded, while his hands were blindly building a small trap out of the sticks on the pile.

It was surprisingly easy to like the boys from 35. I had forbid myself ever to trust anyone again, but something said to me that these two could be useful in the arena since we only had 3 days to train and so much to learn. In the lunch break I went up to the apartment and watched back the preliminaries death of their friend, the one I'd seen lying behind the desk, pierced with countless arrows. It was horrible to see how the boy, whose name was Marten, was murdered by Alexandria. It gave me Goosebumps. However, Mika was telling the truth, because the camera filmed them while they were hiding behind another desk. They had experienced the same horror as me: an almost-death by the girls from 18. I knew they weren't acting nice, like Hayden did.

I just knew Kara and I were going to need their help really badly.

**It took very long to upload a new chapter, sorry (just as long as the delays at the London Underground when I was there :/) but now I'm having a lot of inspiration so new chapter soon!**

**update August 10th - New chapters coming soon! I almost had to repeat my sophomore year so I had to work really hard to keep my grades up, but now it's summer break and I'm really bored so I wrote up to 10,000 new words! New update this week, maybe even tonight :) Thanks for the patience, the reviews, I hope you don't want to stone me for not giving you any new chapters for so long :(**

**Major plot twists coming up 3**


End file.
